Stradling Yocca Carlson & Rauth, PC is a firm of 105 attorneys distributed across a variety of practice areas including corporate and securities, complex business litigation, municipal bond and labor law.  Each practice group has its own way of delivering services to clients, so accommodating such diverse work styles can be a challenge for those of us supporting them.

In 2003, Stradling was nearing the end of the lease on its existing headquarters in Newport Beach, California.  In order to assist us in determining the best course of action, the firm obtained the services of professional space planners.  After considering a number of relocation options suggested by our planners, the firm made the decision to renegotiate a new lease and remain in its current location. 

With our new 10-year lease finalized, we immediately began planning for an overall tenant improvement project.  Our tenant improvements would encompass two main subprojects:  refreshing the general overall look of the firm and expanding and renovating of our central conference spaces.

Although firm management liked the overall look of the existing space, there were a number of cosmetic changes that the planners and architects felt would freshen up the space; new carpet and paint, some minor but visible millwork changes, along with some key lighting changes would all contribute to a brighter feel.

With the general floor changes decided upon, the second visible part of the renovation was set to begin:  the conference center upgrade.  Stradling had a number of conference and breakout rooms that seated anywhere from six to forty people.  Prior to the renovation, the only equipment permanently located in each room were phone handsets with built-in speaker phones.  There was no network connectivity nor presentation capability.  In the past, the IT group would use a check-out system to set up portable projectors and screens, establish connections to our internal network for work sessions and help visitors obtain dial-up connections as needed.

In our conference center upgrade, the objective was to provide a flexible workspace that was adaptable to the changing needs of the firm and its clients.  We wanted to enable this flexibility by deploying key pieces of technology and convenience equipment.  Providing display capabilities, offering a variety of network access methods, making power availability ubiquitous and easing voice communication all topped the list.

The Must Haves
Having gone through it all, the following are what we found to be on the list of "must have" technologies:

Display devices of adequate size.  In this area, we learned a big lesson.  While plasma screens look very good for certain things like video and cable TV, they are less than optimal for document review and drafting sessions.  Although we went with fairly large 50-inch plasma monitors, many complain that documents are difficult to read on them from a distance of more than 10 feet.  Scrutinize the recommendation of your A/V experts on whether to deploy hardwired projection or flat panels.  If at all possible, try them both in each room prior to the final decision.

Audio conferencing capability.  Prior to the renovation, the firm had two Polycom conference phones on hand that were available on a checkout basis.  We purchased one for each conference room and stored them in cabinets in the various rooms.  Instructions on their use were included, and we trained both the IT helpdesk and conference coordination folks on their use.

Power, power and more power.  The least expensive addition was the installation of plug strips just under the edge of each side of every conference table.  Very low profile and costing just a few dollars per table, these give every chair a number of outlets for those power hungry devices.  We've garnered frequent compliments on this feature.

All access pass.  Turning your conference center into a hotspot is one easy and inexpensive way to give it a real boost.  We did this portion of the project ourselves in a week.  We purchased a secondary cable TV and Internet connection.  All the conference rooms' WiFi and hardwired network connections share this Net access.  It's set to configure clients automatically, but it never physically touches our network at all.

Retrospect List
At this point, you're probably wondering what didn't work as well.  Were I to undertake this project again, my checklist might contain some of the following lessons learned:

Input.  Understand the users and get their input.  If you're like most firms, your renovation team will consist of some senior attorneys, some administrative managers and a group of outside vendors ranging from architects and space planners to project managers.  It is also important to be sure you capture the needs of other areas of the firm that may not be directly represented during the renovation process.  And don't forget to poll your peer group.  Internally, other administrative department managers are often exposed to other facilities and features during the course of their work.  Also, it's usually fairly easy to contact other firms via peer organizations (lightly-veiled ILTA plug here).

Budget for real.   Discuss and agree on a realistic budget to achieve the objectives you've told your consultants are important.  One thing we didn't do was tell our A/V consultants what our budget was for those portions of the renovation.  The thinking was that they would spend to the limit we gave them.  While this is a concern, what happened was in the absence of a feel for how much to spend, they went out and specified the best way they could think of to accomplish each objective we had given them.  This proposal came in astronomically over budget.  The process then involved the group going line by line and paring down costs.  The end result, however was a system that neither the A/V people, nor our internal staff was entirely happy with.  We had cut too many corners.

Support is key.  Who will support, maintain, and control the equipment?  Remember that unlike "pure" IT equipment, many of the products you install will be supported and maintained to some degree by others.  They may be conference room support people, secretaries or even the attorneys themselves.  Be sure you have clearly defined maintenance policies for your new equipment, including what the fallback plan is in case a key piece fails.

Seeing is believing.  In a large scale renovation project, you'll be looking at samples of a myriad of things.  Paint, carpet, tile, wood and furniture will all be paraded in front of your team for selection and approval.  Be sure that for your electronics, you not only look at it in this way, but you actually try it in real-world scenarios.  In our case, although we saw our plasma screens before and approved them, had we actually conducted presentations and document review sessions on them, we would have quickly found they were inadequate for some rooms.

Top of the List
A final thought for those of you about to undertake a similar project.  When faced with budget constraints, be sure to weigh your expenditures on infrastructure before end-user equipment.  You may have only one chance to rip into your walls and carpet, so be sure to include any wiring, conduits, electrical and control infrastructure you may need for the future now.  You can always add additional equipment fairly easily later if you lay the proper foundation.  Your users will have a funny habit of finding ways to use your new space in ways you never anticipated.

About our author . . .

Peter Baran is the Director of Technology at Stradling Yocca Carlson & Rauth.  He is responsible for strategic technology planning, operations management and new technology initiatives.  Peter has been in the technology industry for over 15 years, with the past 10 exclusively servicing the legal market.  He can be reached at pbaran@sycr.com.