Lefebvre Dalloz has embarked on a bold digital transformation

Lefebvre Dalloz, a leader in legal, tax, and regulatory knowledge in France, has committed to an ambitious digital transformation to respond to an unprecedented shift in its environment, characterized by:

• Evolving customer needs, with an increasing demand for services associated with expert content and more modular offers (content, formats, media).
• A need for new high-value-added services (APIs, software), such as automated compliance checks based on algorithmic regulation to help businesses better manage their non-compliance risks and improve productivity.
• The revolution of Open Data in the legal field, raising questions about how to exploit and monetize the mass of data made available by public authorities.

In this context, Lefebvre Dalloz’s IT department recognized the need to strengthen its technological capabilities by creating a Chief Technology Officer position within the department, supported by an innovative partner capable of providing robust resources and a wide range of directly actionable solutions.

Marc Blangy, CIO of Lefebvre Dalloz, chose Onepoint for the implementation of this innovative Tech partnership.

Named “CTO as a Service,” this partnership allows Lefebvre Dalloz to benefit from a CTO-like function that can be activated on-demand through Onepoint, providing access to all types of expertise within Onepoint.

The company’s knowledge, its organization, and the different stakeholders within the IT department are maintained and passed on from intervention to intervention, ensuring the transfer of contextualized expertise rather than impersonal knowledge. The contractual framework between Lefebvre Dalloz and Onepoint is also adapted to facilitate this highly fluid collaboration between organizations.

Opening and interconnection of the two organizations

More generally, after a year of implementation, this partnership is based on the principle of openness and interconnection between the two organizations: multiple interactions between teams at different levels, cross-functional coordination, and shared joint events, all aimed at spreading Onepoint’s expertise within the Lefebvre Dalloz environment.

The ultimate goal is to create a virtuous cycle for both organizations and move away from traditional collaboration models or a client/vendor relationship.

A multifaceted partnership, operated in an “As A Service” collaboration mode.

Onepoint supported Lefebvre Dalloz’s IT department in defining and launching its Communities of Practice. These communities, based on strategic technological themes (such as APIs or DevOps) or functional themes (such as technological marketing or project management), aim to showcase Lefebvre Dalloz’s expertise both within and outside the group.

Deployment of Expertise Communities within the IT Department

Onepoint contributes to the deployment of Expertise Communities within the IT department, similar in spirit to those of Onepoint but specifically tailored to the Lefebvre Dalloz context. This approach primarily aims to foster knowledge sharing and the upskilling of employees.

To further integrate the organizations, Lefebvre Dalloz and Onepoint are experimenting with the hybridization of some of these communities, allowing for direct connections between experts.

Support for API Expertise Recruitment

In the process of recruiting tech profiles, Lefebvre Dalloz relies on Onepoint’s experts to assess candidates’ technical expertise, with successful recruitments particularly in API architecture.

Industrialization of the New Ok.doc Search Solution

Through its Atlantic Community, Onepoint ensures the industrialization of the new Ok.doc search solution, developed by Lefebvre Dalloz’s R&D teams using the most modern approaches in NLP (Natural Language Processing). Onepoint serves as a “transition point” between the R&D activities and the IT department, which will eventually take full control of the industrialized solution.

Prospective Study on the Impact of Major Tech Trends

Finally, as part of a group-level reflection for Lefebvre-Sarrut, Onepoint produced a prospective study on the impact of major tech trends (Web 3.0, AI & Data, Cloud, Quantum Computing, etc.) on the group’s value chain (Publishing, Training, Software), with the aim of inspiring the entire management team.

These various topics, with their wide-ranging scopes, helped develop a mutual understanding of the organizations, beyond just the management teams.

A Winning Partnership

After a year of implementation, the partnership has proven to be highly successful from the perspective of the Lefebvre Dalloz IT department, well beyond the results achieved on each of the operational topics worked on with Onepoint.

Indeed, thanks to this partnership, the IT department’s employees have understood the value of opening up more to the outside world to challenge themselves and understand what is being done elsewhere.

Furthermore, the experience with Onepoint has provided tangible proof that a trusted partner can act as an accelerator in transformation: quicker access to relevant and contextualized information, more contacts, and faster connections.

In order to draw the first lessons from such a partnership, a reflection process will be conducted at the end of the year to gather feedback from the various stakeholders, both from Lefebvre Dalloz and Onepoint.

The partnership has already been extended into 2023, with discussions focused on Software Quality and Cybersecurity. It may even expand beyond strictly technological and digital topics, with reflections on the core business areas of Lefebvre Dalloz…