When founding partner Miriam Machado Kleissl prepared to launch Machado Kaufman Ganzella Valentim (MKGV) Advogados in Brazil, she faced an impossible timeline: less than three months to leave a major international firm, migrate extensive document archives, and have her entire team working productively during the Brazilian summer vacations before the firm even had office space. Kleissl made iManage her first investment — ahead of furniture, office space, and billing systems. Her team went live in a remarkable 2.5 months, and on day one, all 14 users were working seamlessly from home. MKGV proves that a technology-first model doesn’t just solve logistics, it builds a foundation for how a modern firm competes.

The business challenge

An ambitious, non-negotiable start date

Kleissl and her three founding partners announced their departure from one of the world’s largest firms just ahead of the Brazilian summer, which runs from December through March, planning to start their new firm by the end of the year. Kleissl said the stakes for MKGV’s launch were existential. The team needed to be fully operational on January 2nd to meet invoicing deadlines, and they didn’t even have office space yet.

“The start date was non-negotiable,” Kleissl says. “It was life or death for the business. People needed to be able to work on the first day we were open, full stop.”

With her four decades of experience at various law firms, Kleissl was well-versed in the challenges MKGV would face if it failed to get document management right, from day one. Preserving the firm’s experience in a single accessible repository where junior attorneys can draw on it is vital to the firm’s growth.

“When drafting a document, or looking for a clause, iManage is where we want people to find it,” says Kleissl.

Headquarters

São Paulo, Brazil

Industry

Legal

Products

iManage Work 10 in the Cloud

iManage Share

iManage Mobility

iManage Microsoft 

Ask iManage

Benefits

  • Immediate economic value
  • Preservation of knowledge
  • 100% LGPD regulations compliance

“Consider what tier you want to operate in. If it’s the top tier, you need iManage.”

Miriam Machado Kleissl, Co-founding partner, Machado Kaufman Ganzella Valentim (MKGV) Advogados

The solution

No half measures

Investing in systems that enable a lean team to serve sophisticated clients with agility, excellence, and results is key to MKGV’s business strategy. “When we decided to start our firm, our first investment was iManage, even before office space,” remembers Kleissl.

And she understands that half-measures don’t work; without the proper structure in place, the firm simply couldn’t function. “You need your firm’s knowledge in one place. I also knew I wanted all the systems to talk among themselves. So having the whole platform on iManage was a no-brainer,” she says.

Kleissl recalls, “I knew I had one shot with MKGV, so there was no consideration of competitors. We needed iManage Work 10 in the Cloud, and no substitutes. I can’t see another product with the same level of organization. There’s probably something else out there, and maybe it’s even cheaper, but seriously — was I going to risk it?”

MKGV implemented iManage Work with iManage Share to ensure secure external deal team collaboration. “One data breach can cost 50 years of work and leave your reputation in the trash,” Kleissl explains. “It might take 35 or 40 years to build that reputation, and it’s gone in 5 minutes. That’s why I made iManage a priority.”

When timing is everything

The timeline was brutal: 2.5 months to migrate extensive document archives and implement the system. Everything depended on iManage being 100 percent  operational on January 2nd. Without it, MKGV couldn’t have opened. Kleissl made the stakes crystal clear to the implementation partners from TOTVS. “I said, listen guys. Either my team will be idle on January 2nd, or they’ll be working. It all depends on you.”

On the scheduled go-live date, Kleissl confirms that the whole office was working on laptops with systems installed and access to all the files. Outlook and Teams were seamlessly integrated. She calls it a record implementation, and remembers a young associate capturing the moment perfectly. “You’re totally unbelievable,” they said — and she responded, “Me? No. But the implementation team are.”

100%

LGPD compliance

2.5 mo.

Planning to go-live

100%

Day 1 adoption

The business outcomes

Record implementation, critical iManage connectivity

The firm was ready to invoice clients in February, despite not securing physical office space until April. That made all the difference between a successful launch and having to delay it for months, which could have been fatal to the business.

The economic value of the implementation was immediately apparent. With full integration of Microsoft 365 and the Toro billing system, Kleissl says, “I can work anywhere. I can input my hours and revise my invoices anywhere, because it’s all available on one platform.”

Automated invoicing notifications create an uninterrupted workflow from time entry through billing. “On iManage, I review invoices in airport lounges in Tokyo, Istanbul, London — wherever I am in the world,” says Kleissl. “For me, that’s priceless.”

The security foundation is equally vital. “I can easily sign declarations for multinational clients that testify to the firm’s data protection measures, because I work with iManage and Toro,” she explains. “And they use all the appropriate security measures.”

Brazilian data protection laws (LGPD) are as strict as European GDPR, with personal liability for managing partners who sign security testimonies for multinational clients. Confidence in the firm’s compliance with LGPD regulations matters profoundly, as managing partners are personally liable. “iManage means I feel safe, I feel comfortable, I sleep peacefully,” Kleissl says, “and that’s a stark contrast to the 4 a.m. anxiety about server infrastructure I experienced in previous firms.”

Technology that’s invisible in the best possible way

The platform allows attorneys to simply do their work, always confident they’re using the correct version and that their document history is preserved. “It’s life-changing,” says Kleissl. “Capabilities like version control, and co-authoring, for example, are so woven into our daily work in iManage that I don’t even think about it.”

Adoption was immediate. The IT manager provided one day of training for a handful of new users. “iManage is very intuitive,” notes Kleissl. “You can drag and drop things to file them. You can search by client, case, or documents.” The system even suggests where to file items based on prior user behavior and the email recipients.

“Technology today is survival,” she notes. “Doing more with less is the reality. But honestly, I’m expecting everything,” says Kleissl. “And with Ask iManage, the platform’s AI assistant, that’s what I get.”

Ask iManage allows natural language queries without the risks of exporting data to third-party vendors. “It doesn’t hallucinate, and my firm and client data stay inside my own environment. Exporting documents to an AI tool outside our system is a risk. Ask iManage solves that for me,” says Kleissl.

According to Kleissl, the lawyer’s role is to add value; the mechanical work should be done by the system. “Ask iManage can analyze, compile, and organize the information, and my lawyers can use their intelligence for strategy, for decision-making.”

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