Migrate from Legal Files to Nutshell

Each Legal Files party becomes a Nutshell Person. Legal Files party_role (Plaintiff, Defendant, Witness, etc.) has no native Nutshell equivalent — we create a custom pick-list field Party_Role__c on Nutshell Person before migration and preserve the role value. Legal Files party_type (Individual or Organization) determines whether the record routes to Nutshell Person or Nutshell Company.

Legal Files parties of type Organization split into Nutshell Company records. The organization's name maps to Nutshell Company name. Contact-level fields (primary_email, primary_phone) map to Nutshell custom fields on the Company. Multiple party contacts from the same organization consolidate to one Nutshell Company.

Each Legal Files matter becomes a Nutshell Deal. The matter_number becomes the Nutshell Deal name (or we concatenate matter_number + matter_description for clarity). Legal Files matter status (Active, Pending, Closed) maps to a Nutshell pipeline stage. All remaining legal fields — case_type, responsible_attorney, opposing_counsel, court, judge — are custom fields on the Deal.

Legal Files calendar events and scheduled tasks migrate as Nutshell Activities. Event subject maps to Nutshell Activity subject. Event date maps to the Activity date field. Event description maps to a custom field or the Activity notes. Original owners resolved by email match to Nutshell users. Recurring events split into individual Activity records.

Legal Files documents and file attachments on parties and matters do not migrate as native files to Nutshell (Nutshell has no built-in document management). We create a Nutshell Note on the related Person or Deal with the document filename, original file path, and a link to the re-uploaded document in your destination storage. The file itself must be re-uploaded to cloud storage (SharePoint, Google Drive, Dropbox) and linked from the Note.

Legal Files custom fields (case_type, party_role, responsible_attorney, opposing_counsel, court, judge, billing_contact, case_number) have no native Nutshell equivalent. We create each as a Nutshell custom field on the appropriate object (Person, Company, or Deal) before migration, preserving field type (pick-list, text, date, number). Custom pick-list values are mapped value-by-value to Nutshell pick-list options.

Legal Files allows a party to have multiple roles across multiple matters (one party, many matters). Nutshell Deals link to People via a simple association. For each Legal Files matter-party relationship, we link the migrated Nutshell Person to the migrated Nutshell Deal. If a party has multiple roles, we store each role as a separate Deal-Person link via custom field routing.

Legal Files party roles (Plaintiff, Defendant, Opposing Counsel, Co-Counsel, Witness, Expert, Mediator, Arbitrator, etc.) are a legal-specific field with no Nutshell equivalent. We create a Nutshell custom pick-list field Party_Role__c on the Person object and map each Legal Files role value to the corresponding Nutshell pick-list option. Parties with multiple roles are handled via multiple Person-Deal links or a multi-select custom field.

Legal Files categorizes matters by type (Litigation, Corporate, Real Estate, Intellectual Property, Family Law, Bankruptcy, etc.). Nutshell has no native case type field. We create a Nutshell custom pick-list field Case_Type__c on the Deal object, define the pick-list values to match Legal Files, and map each matter's type value. Stage names in Legal Files map to Nutshell Deal pipeline stages, preserving the original stageentered timestamp.

Legal Files documents, PDFs, word files, and email attachments stored in the document repository are exported as files. We create Nutshell Notes on the target record (Person or Deal) referencing each document by name and original path. Your team re-uploads the documents to a connected storage system (SharePoint, Google Drive, Box) and updates the Note with the new link. This preserves traceability without requiring Nutshell's native file storage to handle legal-sized document volumes.

Legal Files' Microsoft Outlook integration (email filing directly to matters, calendar sync) has no Nutshell equivalent. These integrations must be disconnected in Legal Files before migration and reconfigured in Nutshell using Nutshell's native Google Workspace and Microsoft 365 integrations, available in the Nutshell AppConnect marketplace. Email-to-case routing, if used in Legal Files, must be rebuilt using Nutshell's email sync settings.

Legal Files workflows, matter intake forms, approval chains, and deadline escalation rules do not migrate. They must be rebuilt in Nutshell's automation tools (Nutshell Sequences, Workflow Rules). We export your Legal Files workflow definitions as a reference document listing each rule's trigger, conditions, and actions so your Nutshell admin can rebuild them. This export is delivered alongside the migration data map.

Each Legal Files record carries an internal ID. We store this as a custom text field Source_System_ID__c on the Nutshell record (Person, Company, or Deal) for traceability. The source ID enables delta-run de-duplication, audit logging, and rollback reference if reconciliation fails. Original created_date from Legal Files is preserved as a custom datetime field Created_In_Source__c on the target Nutshell record.