June 2023 - SPOC

Streamlined legal operations: unlock efficiency with a dedicated legal app

Posted on 27 June 202325 June 2024 by Malwina

The fast-paced digital landscape presents unique challenges for the legal practice, with a surge in case volumes, complex regulations, and the need for quick turnarounds. To meet these demands, you need to embrace cutting-edge technology. Dedicated apps built on the ServiceNow platform offer a promising avenue to enhance productivity, simplify workflows, and foster collaboration among legal professionals.

Corporate legal teams’ adoption of legal tech has gained momentum due to the exhaustion experienced in-house. According to Gartner, many organizations are cautious about increasing the headcount in their legal departments despite the growing workloads these teams face. This has led to a surge in interest regarding legal tech adoption. Gartner’s findings revealed that 68% of corporate legal attorneys struggled to manage their workloads in 2020, and the pressures have only intensified with the rise in business activity since then.

As law firms recognize the need to alleviate the burden on their teams, adopting legal tech solutions becomes increasingly crucial. Building a great app for IoS and Android devices can empower legal teams to navigate the complexities of the digital era while improving efficiency and effectiveness in delivering legal services.

Meeting legal needs in a digital work environment with mobile apps

Legal professionals face many challenges arising from the increasing pace of technological advancements. The traditional methods and processes that once sufficed are no longer adequate to meet the demands of this interconnected era. Legal practitioners require dynamic solutions that adapt to their evolving needs and effectively support their daily tasks. Some of these challenges include the time-consuming nature of administrative tasks, which often distract lawyers from their core legal work. Additionally, the presence of multiple layers of communication and manual handovers can lead to information being lost or delayed, resulting in miscommunication and the potential for errors.

As legal professionals strive to navigate the complexities of a digital work environment and effectively manage client data, it’s imperative to embrace the transformative potential of legal apps. These innovative tools empower legal practitioners to streamline their legal practice, granting easy access to all your documents and enabling seamless completion of tasks on a mobile device. Embracing technology is no longer just a trend but an essential requirement to thrive in today’s fast-paced digital landscape. By harnessing the power of the best apps, which are tailored to the specific needs, legal professionals can overcome challenges, optimize their workflow, and deliver exceptional results for their clients.
Adam Bernaś, Chief Technology Officer – SPOC

How to transform legal workflow with a legal app?

At SPOC, we collaborated closely with our clients within the legal industry to develop dedicated apps, harnessing the robust capabilities of ServiceNow. These apps brought a transformative shift in their operations, eliminating the need for cumbersome paper-based processes. We thought that the best apps should be configured to support the secretarial teams in managing the lifecycle of tasks, reporting, feedback, and capabilities. And that is what we did! We addressed the specific challenges faced by the legal team and revolutionized their workflow:

Streamlined request assignment: One of the primary pain points for the legal team was the decentralized inbox and service portal. The app provided a centralized mailbox, simplifying and automating the assignment of requests to the appropriate team members. It reduced the likelihood of misfiled tasks, duplication of effort, and missed assignments.
Real-time task tracking: The app gave lawyers instant access to their tasks and cases, allowing them to track progress and monitor the amount of time invested in each one. This enhanced visibility, improved accountability, and facilitated efficient time management, ensuring that deadlines were met and resources were allocated effectively.
Seamless communication: Integration with ServiceNow enabled seamless communication between lawyers and secretaries. By eliminating the need for manual handovers and multiple inboxes, the app provided a unified platform for collaboration, allowing swift and accurate transfer of tasks. Consequently, it reduced response times and minimized the impact on Outlook’s performance.

In addition, the app offered several other business benefits for the company. It provided a single portal with customized interactive forms, simplifying the submission process and capturing all necessary information and instructions. Mobile access allowed legal professionals to stay connected and productive while on the move. The app also automated manual processes within the team’s workflows, increasing efficiency and reducing the risk of human error. Management reporting capabilities provided valuable insights into utilization and resource planning, aiding decision-making and optimizing resource allocation.

Revolutionized operations for law firms

Dedicated apps built on ServiceNow can significantly benefit legal teams, including workload allocation, resource visibility, and enhanced efficiency. These apps automate task assignments, streamline processes, and provide real-time information access. By embracing these solutions, law firms gain a competitive edge, improve collaboration, and achieve significant business value in the digital era, being able to solve many problems via mobile phone.

We witnessed the transformative power of legal apps and Service Now in action when our clients, two leading law firms, implemented a tailored app to address their unique challenges. By leveraging this solution, they experienced remarkable improvements in operations and efficiency. With the app accessible on their mobile devices, they were able to effortlessly create documents, complete tasks, manage cases, record time, and add notes, all within a unified platform.

This comprehensive solution provided them with seamless access to vital information, enabling them to resolve cases in a fast manner, organize workflows, and enhance productivity. It’s worth checking out the ability of legal apps built on Service Now as the first step toward optimizing processes and mitigating common issues faced by law firms. By embracing these solutions, legal professionals can create, collaborate, and efficiently manage their work, unlocking a new level of efficiency and productivity.

If you and your legal company recognize the potential of such a solution, we invite you to contact us. As experts and an Elite Partner of ServiceNow, we have the expertise and experience to assist you in implementing and leveraging these dedicated apps to transform your legal operations. Contact us today at sales@spoc.eu to schedule a demo and explore how we can empower your team and drive greater organizational efficiency.

Cybersecurity in the financial sector: embracing automation and integration as Excel takes a backseat

Posted on 26 June 202325 June 2024 by Malwina

The ever-evolving EU regulations present ongoing challenges for financial institutions. Relying solely on traditional methods like countless Excel spreadsheets falls short of ensuring robust cybersecurity measures. The time has come to embrace solutions that offer automation, seamless integration, and utmost protection.

The financial sector faces multiple security challenges and needs to meet stringent regulatory compliance requirements. Introducing the Digital Operational Resilience Act (DORA) imposes new obligations and demands on financial institutions.

To tackle these obstacles, institutions require innovative IT solutions that integrate various security aspects seamlessly and enable centralized management. Leading the way in this field, ServiceNow offers comprehensive solutions that address these needs, ensuring high security for financial institutions.

Simplifying cybersecurity implementation through outsourcing

In cybersecurity, it is crucial to consider the requirements set by the European Union. Financial institutions are responsible for implementing any EU regulations and guidelines changes. When new security requirements emerge as part of regulations, organizations must focus on understanding and implementing these changes to ensure compliance with the law.

There are two primary options for adapting to regulatory requirements. The first option is an internal process where financial institutions analyze the new requirements and determine how to adjust their procedures, systems, and infrastructure accordingly.

However, given the increasing complexity of cybersecurity issues, the financial sector increasingly turns to external partners with specialized knowledge and experience.

These external providers are well-equipped to identify and understand crucial aspects that internal processes may overlook or lose. By collaborating with experienced vendors, organizations can concentrate on their core activities while ensuring that their systems and data are adequately protected and compliant with regulations.

How to navigate the DORA challenges?

The Digital Operational Resilience Act (DORA) is a comprehensive strategy developed by the European Union to fortify the financial sector’s operational resilience against digital threats. Published in 2020, it aims to ensure security, stability, and data protection within digital financial services.

In light of these challenges, financial institutions must adapt their systems and procedures to meet the new DORA requirements and enhance the security of customer data. Many institutions grapple with this issue, relying on fragmented and non-integrated internal security systems. This is where ServiceNow emerges as a solution, enabling the consolidation of these elements into a unified platform.

ServiceNow integrates security processes into a single platform, eliminating the need for multiple systems and dismantling silos. Financial sector entities can leverage powerful tools like workflows, facilitating the effortless implementation of changes, monitoring compliance with the DORA Directive, and enabling swift response to incidents.

High level of security = data integration

Ensuring robust security is paramount for financial institutions entrusted with vast volumes of sensitive data. ServiceNow offers comprehensive solutions that effectively monitor and safeguard their systems. By integrating diverse security components into a unified platform, financial institutions can seamlessly manage incidents, identify vulnerabilities, ensure compliance with security policies, and streamline security management processes.

Information consistency plays a pivotal role in this context. Traditional approaches often rely on multiple systems and tools, resulting in fragmented information that hampers efficient analysis and response to threats. ServiceNow resolves these challenges by providing a singular source of truth.

With ServiceNow, all security incidents, whether reported by users or detected automatically, are diligently monitored and tracked within a centralized hub. It facilitates prompt identification, analysis, and response to incidents, with the capability to assign them to appropriate specialists for further action. By consolidating incident data and information within a single system, management becomes more streamlined, and complete transparency is achieved throughout the threat response process.

A key attribute of ServiceNow is its incident prioritization capability. Leveraging sophisticated algorithms and predefined rules, the system can automatically assess the severity of threats and assign priority to each incident report. This empowers organizations to focus on incidents with the highest potential impact and immediate risk, ensuring swift and effective response measures are implemented.

Streamlining security operations with automated threat detection

Financial institutions that use ServiceNow solutions can perform regular system scans to identify vulnerabilities and issues in their IT infrastructure. This enables them to assess risks more effectively and take necessary actions to enhance security. Automation eliminates manual data processing, leading to faster identification and remediation of vulnerabilities. In practice, it means fewer errors, as with spreadsheets and incomplete files.

Source: ServiceNow https://www.servicenow.com/products/security-operations/what-is-secops.html

The financial sector often faces challenges due to isolated information silos and errors resulting from manual processes. Leveraging secure and proven technological solutions like ServiceNow is highly recommended to overcome these challenges. Through ServiceNow’s platform and SecOps solution, institutions can integrate their security processes, reducing the risk of errors. Automation and centralized data within ServiceNow facilitate efficient incident management and response, enabling better handling of security challenges and improving service quality.
Tomasz Prokopowicz, Senior Project Manager, coordinating the Information Security Management System, SPOC

ServiceNow’s Security Operations (SecOps) solution empowers organizations to manage security incidents effectively. By consolidating incident reports in one place and automatically assigning them to the right specialists, organizations can respond to threats promptly and eliminate them swiftly. No more delays in information sharing! Specialized individuals or teams are immediately informed and engaged in resolving the issue.

Moreover, ServiceNow provides transparent progress monitoring for incident resolution, enabling organizations to track and report on their security activities in a better way. This supports compliance monitoring with legal requirements such as the GDPR and security standards like PCI DSS. Institutions can customize reports according to their needs and receive real-time compliance insights.

A single point of Truth for Cybersecurity

ServiceNow provides comprehensive solutions for the financial sector, integrating various security aspects into a single platform. This simplifies security management, helping institutions meet regulatory requirements, protect their clients, and respond effectively to threats.

By using ServiceNow, financial institutions can streamline their cybersecurity efforts, saving time on manual tasks. Automation and centralized data enable specialists to focus on tackling potential threats instead of searching for them. It boosts efficiency, effectiveness, and overall security outcomes.
Piotr Górnikiewicz, Business Development Manager, SPOC

ServiceNow empowers financial institutions to concentrate on vital aspects of their operations. The platform assists in identifying, monitoring, and responding to threats, safeguarding company assets, customer data, and reputation. Thanks to that, the organization can build customer trust and solidify its market position.

If your financial institution seeks expertise in implementing ServiceNow solutions, reach out to us. As a ServiceNow Elite Partner, we possess the knowledge and over a decade of experience to tailor solutions to your specific needs.

Maximizing Project Visibility and Business Value: A Deep Dive into ServiceNow’s PPM Solution

Posted on 14 June 202325 June 2024 by Malwina

According to research, approximately 70% of companies experience project management failures. These failures can manifest in various forms, including budget overruns, missed deadlines, scope creep, and unsatisfactory project outcomes. Effective project management practices and robust tools like ServiceNow’s PPM solution play a crucial role in mitigating these risks and increasing the likelihood of project success.

We have seen first-hand with our clients how ServiceNow’s PPM solution empowers them to manage their project portfolios effectively, enabling them to make informed decisions, streamline workflows, and drive exceptional outcomes. From daily project management tasks to budgeting and holistic oversight, ServiceNow’s PPM offers valuable insights and actionable data that help you overcome the challenges of managing multiple projects.

From Streamlined Project Management to High-Level Oversight

At the heart of ServiceNow’s PPM lies its ability to streamline daily project management tasks. Through a simple and intuitive interface, the PPM system standardizes and tracks project activities effectively. The demand management module allows the review of project drafts, ensuring alignment with strategic goals. Within the project workspace, project status, baseline, percentage of completion, issues, risks, and tasks can be easily monitored. Gantt charts enable visualizing project progress, enhancing project management efficiency.

Beyond daily project management, ServiceNow’s PPM proves invaluable in budgeting and identifying projects that may require attention. The system provides financial reports that offer insights into project profitability. Crucial information such as milestones, goals, project statuses, and risk outlooks are readily available, enabling proactive risk management and opportunity identification. You not only have the tools to manage risks but also to identify and capitalize on opportunities.

Empowering PMOs through the right project management tool

PMOs require a bigger picture of the project landscape to align projects with strategic objectives and optimize resource allocation effectively. Navigating the project landscape solely through spreadsheets can be cumbersome, time-consuming, and prone to errors, hindering the PMO’s ability to gain holistic insights and make informed decisions.

For Project Management Offices (PMOs), ServiceNow’s PPM presents a comprehensive overview in one centralized location. This holistic view facilitates informed decision-making, quick response to project changes, better control, and enhanced budgeting capabilities. Additionally, it enables the realization of company objectives and key performance indicators (KPIs). The user-friendly interface allows easy zooming in and out, empowering PMOs to gain deep insights into project details while maintaining a high-level overview. This is especially important in organizations that face complex project management portfolios, such as, for example, pharmaceutical companies.

PPM tool will bring an efficient digital environment with common processes for project management approach within the full spectrum of complex Pharma projects and harmonise communication of metrics, reports and dashboards throughout our organisation.

SPOC brought during the entire implementation a good willingness to learn and understand from our experience in every challenge trying to fulfil our requirements in managing complex projects in the Biotech industry, even though we had to postpone key topics for future releases.
Director Head of PMO & Strategic Planning at pharmaceutical company

Strategic Portfolio Management: Exploring the Comprehensive Offerings Beyond PPM

It is important to remember that PPM serves as a feature within the broader system of Strategic Portfolio Management (SPM) in ServiceNow. SPM provides a seamless framework for organizations to work fluently and effectively scale their projects by promptly identifying and addressing risks and delays. While PPM is a critical component, there are other captivating offerings that could appeal to you if you work as a PM or PMO. These include all:

Innovation Management: This feature allows employees to submit their innovative ideas, which can be voted on and commented upon by others. It also covers a basic draft of the idea for a potential project. Ideas are evaluated during company meetings to determine which ones are feasible and merit further development.
Demand Management: Before a demand can be converted into a project, this phase involves gathering comprehensive information about the potential project, including work phases, names, categories, and required resources. Once qualified and approved, the demand can be transformed into an official project.
Agile Development: While SPM predominantly supports Waterfall methodology, this feature allows users to work in an Agile environment, providing flexibility for those who prefer Agile practices.
Performance Analytics: Similarly, to other parts of ServiceNow, Performance Analytics offers enhanced reporting capabilities, delivering in-depth insights beyond traditional dashboards. This enables you to access next-level reports and make data-driven decisions.
Resource Management: This solution allows us to effectively allocate and optimize resources across projects. It provides insights into resource availability, skills, and workload, facilitating informed decisions on resource allocation. This feature maximizes resource utilization, reduces bottlenecks, and ensures that the right resources are assigned to the right projects at the right time.

The Full Potential of ServiceNow’s PPM Across the Organization

You need to remember that ServiceNow’s PPM is not confined to the IT department but caters to the entire organization. Implementing ServiceNow’s PPM solution gives you a clear dashboard overview, reliable project, and program information, and significant improvements in the development processes.

ServiceNow’s PPM solution offers your organization a transformative approach to managing projects effectively. From daily project management tasks to budgeting and holistic oversight, the PPM system provides valuable insights and actionable data. Whether you’re a project manager seeking better control or a PMO aiming for strategic decision-making, ServiceNow’s PPM empowers you to maximize project visibility and achieve exceptional business value. If you want to know more about Project Portfolio Management, reach out to us at sales@spoc.eu.

SecOps: Strengthening Cybersecurity in Financial Institutions and Banks

Posted on 5 June 20237 August 2024 by Malwina

In today’s digital age, financial firms face unprecedented cybersecurity threats that can compromise sensitive data and lead to significant financial losses. The increasing frequency and sophistication of cyber-attacks highlight the urgent need for robust cybersecurity measures in the financial sector. That’s where Security Operations (SecOps) come into play.

SecOps is a comprehensive approach to cybersecurity that integrates security practices with operations to detect, respond to, and mitigate cyber risks effectively. It consists of the convergence and collaboration of IT security and IT operations to break down silos within the broader IT organization. The primary goal is to achieve security objectives without compromising the overall performance of IT systems.

The rising cyber risk in financial institutions

Financial services have always been prime targets for cybercriminals due to the wealth of information they possess. The financial industry has seen a surge in cyber attacks, with 71% of all data breaches being financially motivated. These attacks range from sophisticated hacking attempts to social engineering tactics to trick employees into revealing login credentials. The consequences of successful cyber attacks in the banking industry are dire, with the cost reaching a staggering $18.3 million annually per company!

Source: ServiceNow “Enterprise Strategy Group: Security Hygiene Report”

One of the most prevalent threats is the deployment of malicious code, which can lead to data breaches and unauthorized access to financial data. Cybercriminals utilize advanced techniques to infiltrate banking networks, bypass security measures, and exfiltrate valuable information. Mobile devices, often used by bank employees and customers for financial transactions, have become a prime target for cyber attackers.

Ransomware attacks pose another significant threat to the banking sector. These attacks involve the use of malicious software to encrypt sensitive data and hold it hostage until a ransom is paid. Phishing attacks also remain a significant concern for banks. Cybercriminals employ deceptive tactics, such as masquerading as legitimate entities or creating convincing fake websites, to trick individuals into revealing their login credentials or other sensitive information. Phishing targets both bank employees and customers, aiming to gain unauthorized access to financial systems or personal banking accounts.

Unfortunately, the banking industry is not immune to cloud-based attacks. As financial institutions increasingly adopt cloud infrastructure for their operations, they become potential targets for cyber attackers seeking to exploit vulnerabilities within cloud environments. Breaches in cloud-based systems can result in the exposure of sensitive data and compromise the integrity of banking operations.

Robust cyber security needed

The consequences of these cyber security breaches can be severe. They can lead to financial losses, reputational damage, legal repercussions, and a loss of customer trust. With the financial industry’s interconnected nature, a single vulnerable link in the security chain can have far-reaching implications.

To combat the ever-evolving cyber threats, financial institutions must adopt a proactive cybersecurity strategy. Implementing ServiceNow SecOps practices enables banks to effectively identify vulnerabilities, detect cyber threats, and respond swiftly to security incidents. By streamlining security operations, SecOps ensures that priorities are better managed and consolidated, communication and information are integrated, and tools and technology are joined together. This holistic approach reduces the strain on resources and enhances cyber resilience.

Source: ServiceNow “Enterprise Strategy Group: Security Hygiene Report”

The banking sector frequently faces challenges stemming from isolated information silos and the risks associated with manual processes. This highlights the importance of leveraging trusted and secure technological solutions like ServiceNow. By adopting the ServiceNow platform and its SecOps solution, banks can seamlessly integrate their security processes, reducing the potential for errors and mitigating cyber security risks. The automation and data centralization capabilities of ServiceNow enable efficient incident management and response, ensuring compliance and effectively addressing security challenges. This, in turn, enhances the overall quality of services provided by banks.
Tomasz Prokopowicz, Senior Project Manager and coordinator of the Information Security Management System at SPOC

Benefits of SecOps in the financial sector

1. Enhanced Efficiency: With SecOps, you can automate key security procedures and orchestrate effective responses, saving time and reducing the reliance on manual work. By automating repetitive tasks, security teams can focus on analyzing and mitigating emerging threats, leading to increased operational efficiency.

2. Strengthened Cloud Security: The adoption of cloud infrastructure has brought numerous benefits but has also introduced new security challenges. SecOps provides a framework to minimize cloud security issues by addressing vulnerabilities, ensuring secure configurations, and implementing robust security controls. This results in fewer security breaches, fewer vulnerabilities, and a safer security environment overall.

3. Improved Application Resilience: Application disruptions can have severe consequences. SecOps helps mitigate these risks by reducing configuration errors and ensuring that changes in application code align with deployment rules. By implementing secure coding practices and continuous monitoring, you can maintain the integrity of the software systems.

4. Effective Risk Management: SecOps enables you to identify and address known vulnerabilities proactively. Your organizations can enforce compliance with appropriate standards and regulations by implementing auditing procedures. This helps protect sensitive information and reduces legal costs associated with non-compliance.

ServiceNow SecOps – a solution that looks ahead

ServiceNow provides an all-in-one platform for managing and consolidating security vulnerabilities and incidents. It offers a comprehensive suite of tools and technologies to streamline security operations, facilitate effective communication and information sharing, and automate key security procedures. With ServiceNow SecOps, financial institutions can leverage machine learning capabilities to detect and respond to cyber threats in real time, enhancing their cyber resilience.

Utilizing ServiceNow to optimize cybersecurity in banks significantly reduces time spent on manual work and improves risk management. Through automation and data centralization, employees can focus on responding to potential threats and resolving issues rather than wasting time searching for them. This contributes to increased efficiency and effectiveness, as well as achieving better security outcomes.
Piotr Górnikiewicz, Business Development Manager at SPOC

As the financial industry becomes increasingly interconnected, the cybersecurity landscape continues to evolve, making it essential for banks to stay ahead of emerging threats. By implementing SecOps practices, you can protect sensitive data, mitigate cyber risks, and maintain the trust of your customers. Investing in cybersecurity solutions like SecOps is crucial to safeguarding the integrity of financial systems and preserving their reputation. If you want to know, contact us.

Month: June 2023