Transforming Legal Operations: From Tactical to Strategic
What is Legal Operations?
"Legal Operations provides strategic planning, financial management, project management, and technology portfolio investment expertise that allows legal professionals to focus on providing legal advice…Their capabilities allow the legal organization to more effectively manage risks, monitor compliance, incorporate the right technological tools, and deliver more value to the enterprise by accelerating the business. A proactive Legal operations team can anticipate and plan for challenges before they arrive." - cloc.org
Over two decades ago, a new function began to emerge in corporate legal departments — legal operations. As the business world increased its reliance on data analytics, there was a clear need to bring together teams, tools, and practices to support the legal department’s business functions. What initially began as a cost management practice soon grew to include managing legal projects, running eDiscovery operations, supporting internal teams with legal guidance, and serving business counterparts in routine legal tasks. The legal operations professional role evolved to include operational management practices across the department, requiring professionals who could approach legal tasks in ways that promoted better performance and business outcomes.
Today, however, the Legal Ops role has become less about strategically aligning objectives that support the organization’s broader goals and more about “putting out fires.” By dropping strategy for tactical response, corporate legal departments have reduced the impact that Legal Ops can have on the department’s efficiency, process development and management, cost reduction, technology implementation, and planning.
Is it time to return Legal Ops to a more strategic and proactive role? We offer the following insights in response to this compelling question.
Why Legal Departments Need Strong Legal Ops
Supporting a large organization’s legal needs is a heavy lift. Managing complex legal issues, supporting regulatory compliance, and handling a daily barrage of communication requires a fine balance between the department and the processes it follows. The legal operations function can greatly benefit lawyers and legal department teams when strategically implemented in several key areas.
- Cost Containment: A thorough budget review combined with in-depth analysis of the department’s functions can help ensure that financial resources are used where they are most needed.
- Process Efficiency: Identifying and tracking the types of work being done and who has the acumen to best handle that work can lead to streamlined processes and more impactful use of resources. A Legal Ops manager might start by assessing how current resources are being used through activity mapping, data analysis, and a thorough study of processes before recommending a course of action.
- Resource Management: Poor coordination within the department can lead to bottlenecks and missed opportunities as underutilized staff become bored and overutilized staff experience burnout. Legal Ops can serve as a central hub that manages resources to their best advantage and provides insights for informed decision making.
- Outside Vendors: In some cases, outsourcing might serve the department’s needs better than using in-house staff. When legal operations professionals are included in the planning, they can provide decision makers with details about costs, quality, and potential outcomes.
- Technology Assessments: Selecting technology that supports department goals without breaking the budget requires more than number crunching. A Legal Ops professional who analyzes the department’s resources and requirements can provide valuable insight when choosing which software and equipment are needed — and whether it is needed at all.
A robust legal operations function can help the legal department improve performance with business counterparts, facilitate deeper insights within and across the department, and enhance competitive advantage. Even so, corporate legal departments that create a new vision for their legal operations group may encounter a few obstacles.
When Challenges and Opportunities Arise
When a corporate legal department experiences increased pressure to perform at higher levels, it is possible to lose sight of the department’s operational needs. This is where Legal Ops can shine. When a Legal Ops team develops and implements a new strategic vision, leaders can focus more on achieving goals and improving business outcomes. As obstacles are overcome, opportunities may arise.
For example, there can be a lack of clarity on the legal operations professional’s role in the department. The legal department may overlook chances to advantageously use Legal Ops, assigning mundane tasks that cannot result in long-term strategic benefits. Defining roles and expectations for Legal Ops professionals — and expanding their remit— can lead to higher-level benefits for the department.
Legal department teams settled into their roles may be reluctant to embrace change. This may occur because the legal operations professionals have not been integrated into the team. Facilitating collaboration between Legal Ops and other teams within the legal department can help overcome resistance to change and promote awareness of the value that legal operations can provide.
Finally, budgets for the department may constrain the Legal Ops team and over-emphasize cost reduction. Instead, a legal operations professional can provide insights necessary for informed decision making to drive maximum impact.
Returning Legal Operations to a More Strategic Role
A robust legal operations team can do more than administrative tasks, but the first task is to elevate their role by incorporating them into the strategic planning for the entire legal department. Here are some ways to make this happen:
- Give Legal Ops a view into all areas of the department to enable and empower the development of plans that break free of the old ways of working.
- Examine processes based on step-by-step activity analysis.
- Allow legal operations staff to conduct feedback surveys with lawyers and business leaders to help align operations with goals, objectives, and expected outcomes.
- Allow legal operations to use activity mapping and other tools that can lead to KPI frameworks that help leaders focus on what matters most.
- Let Legal Ops manage the current legal technology portfolio and advise when new technology or training is needed.
- Provide full details of budgets and current spending so Legal Ops can take an objective look at the department’s overall financial picture.
Executing the new vision for legal operations means embracing innovation while returning the function to its roots.
Is Your Legal Operations Function Operating Strategically and Proactively?
Harness the power of Legal Ops by reimagining its possibilities. Our Legal Operations team can help with analysis, activity mapping, metrics, data governance, legal tech portfolio management, and developing roadmaps tailored to your corporate legal department’s specific needs. Please contact us for more information.
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