Advanced technologies such as artificial intelligence (AI), data integrations, smart contracting, and automation are propelling a fundamental transformation in the legal industry. Confronted by ever-evolving regulatory and business requirements—and the business mantra of “doing more with less”—today’s legal operations professionals are discovering ways to harness technology to improve legal services, boost efficiency, and deliver increased value to their organizations.
But staying ahead of the curve requires a proactive mindset, a willingness to adapt, and a commitment to continuous learning and improvement. Becoming more agile in the strategic use of technology empowers legal teams to help internal clients automate routine tasks, use advanced analytics to enhance decision-making, and streamline operations.
Making this happen requires legal operations professionals to be at the heart of developing strategic legal technology roadmaps and managing legal technology portfolios. We offer the following actionable insights to help you understand and handle the impact tech trends are having on the legal operations industry.
Aligning Tech to Business Problems
The journey toward a fully integrated legal technology environment begins with gaining a deep understanding of the needs and objectives of your legal department’s internal clients. This typically requires the ability to speak “multiple languages” (e.g., technology, legal, and business). Tools and resources may not be leveraged to their full advantage if legal teams overlook the needs of their business counterparts or fail to recognize the necessary balance between staying competitive and maintaining compliance with the applicable rules and regulations. However, aligning technology initiatives with both enterprise-wide and more specific legal and business objectives allows for the tailoring of technology solutions to address those needs efficiently and effectively.
Once the legal team and internal customer requirements have been identified, it is crucial to ensure that the existing technology portfolio is fully leveraged before considering both the legacy capabilities of “owned tools” as well as those of new tools. Often, legal operations teams can find capabilities in tools that may be owned by other teams that can be repurposed for their needs. This process involves reviewing all existing technologies, analyzing telemetrics, and aligning tools with key data controls, metrics, and performance indicators.
Taking these steps can enable the organization to use existing technology to support overall alignment with both legal and business objectives more comprehensively and efficiently.
Identifying Opportunities and Risks in Current Tech Trends
With new capabilities come new opportunities and risks. These may include any or all of the following:
- Choosing the Right Tech: Software providers and legacy vendors generate significant hype around their new technology and tools. However, legal departments should measure the potential benefits of the latest technology not by how slick a demo is but, rather, by how well the proposed tool can solve real business problems and satisfy the fundamental needs of their organization.
- Managing Budget Allocation: Shiny new tools often come with significant hard and soft costs. Applying the right calculus to determine what ROI would look like with both qualitative and quantitative measures is crucial; a legal team’s potential investment includes not only actual budget allocation, but also the personnel needed for compliance, security and privacy obligations, records identification, and retention.
- Integrating New Technology: With the rapid pace of legal technology’s evolution, change management becomes a significant focus. Integrating new technology into legal operations extends beyond technical implementation; it requires managing the human aspects of change, too. This means fostering a culture of adaptability and helping all stakeholders understand the value and benefits of technological advancements. Effective change management can drive successful adoption and enhance the impact of legal technology investments.
As legal departments navigate these opportunities and risks, the strategic adoption of technology becomes paramount. By carefully selecting and adopting the right tools, managing budget allocations effectively, and ensuring seamless integration, legal teams can access the full potential of technological advancements. This approach not only addresses immediate business needs but also can position legal operations for long-term success.
Harnessing Technology for Legal Ops
Insights from industry authorities provide a glimpse into the future of the industry, where technology can be a transformative force reshaping the very fabric of legal operations. As new tools come into play, it is important to use lessons learned from challenges in past endeavors to help enable a “fail faster” mechanism and contribute to future long-term achievements. However, legal teams should seek solutions within current tools across the enterprise as a first step, build relationships with internal product owners, and consider further investments in already-onboarded tools and their available enhancements before looking outward for the next shiny object.
As the industry continues to evolve, the integration of technology in legal practice ecosystems is not just a trend but a fundamental shift that may define the industry for years to come. Legal departments that embrace this change and strategically manage their technology may be well-positioned to meet the demands of an increasingly complex legal environment.
Eric Derk is a managing director of forensics and legal operations at BDO. BDO’s legal operations team can help with analysis, activity mapping, metrics, data governance, tech portfolio management, and developing roadmaps tailored to your legal department’s specific needs.
