Coping with rapid content growth: Time spent searching for, sifting through, organizing, and managing information takes away from time teams could use to fine-tune advice and ensure quality of final deliverables.

Improving team collaboration: Without effective tools for collaborating across multiple departments and locations, team members are forced to spend valuable time maintaining accurate versions of documents, arranging and holding meetings, and waiting for content during lags in workflow or bottlenecks in review cycles.

Removing impediments to mobile worker productivity: Remote worker productivity is limited by firewalls and poor connectivity. Many professional services teams have adopted team sites to collaborate within the corporate firewall, but still use e-mail and the telephone to work with team members and clients outside the firewall. Real-time collaboration across firewalls via e-mail is limited by lack of version control, difficulty connecting, and the absence of accountability tracking. These limitations not only reduce individual productivity, but they also hamper team collaboration, slow down progress on deliverables, and disrupt project schedules.

Giving clients visibility into projects: Clients have little or no visibility into the status of project deliverables and tasks, which reduces client satisfaction and requires teams to spend more time reporting this information to clients.

Addressing inefficient, cumbersome reporting on projects: Internal project status reporting is often labor-intensive and time-consuming due to the lack of adequate workflow processes and the automation of routine tasks.

Managing risk and compliance: Professional services-related decisions and documents are subject to a heightened risk of litigation and damaged reputation stemming from the delivery of flawed advice or noncompliance with industry regulations. New regulations have increased the risks of transferring and storing sensitive client data, increasing the need for firms to provide data assurance.

Integrated team workspaces provide client services teams with an intra-firm collaboration environment focused on a specific project—for example, a legal matter, an accounting or consulting engagement, or an architectural, engineering, or IT services project. The workspace portal integrates all existing firm systems for document management, billing and invoicing, financial reporting, and instant messaging, providing team members with a holistic view of the project, and fast, easy access to all information necessary for timely and successful completion. An integrated team workspace also enables global virtual teams to assemble around a project to better serve the client's needs.

Integrated client workspaces, or client extranets, are external-facing project portals that provide clients with secure access to shared documents. Clients see only the information they should see—what has been delivered or changed, how much has been or remains to be paid, and so on—enabling the firm and the client services team to better manage the client's experience of service. Client workspaces also enable interactive collaboration between a client services team and clients, helping teams to fine-tune projects and deliver the expertly tailored service solutions clients demand today.

Collaboration and communication: Integrated team and client workspaces enable teams within your firm to collaborate effectively, and they enhance communication between your people and clients.

Mobile and offline capabilities: Powerful mobile and offline connectivity capabilities can help remote workers stay productive, which means teams can meet their targets and schedules.

Integrated workflow: Streamlining assignments, approvals, and project reporting helps teams meet their promised goals on time, and it helps ensure document security.

Security and risk management: Professionals can minimize and manage risk and improve compliance through better control of who has access to data and information, more effective application of document retention policy, and clear audit trails to make professionals accountable for their situational judgment.