Susan Patrick President & CEO International Association for K-12 Online Learning
Susan Hackett | CEO Legal Executive Leadership, LLC
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www.lawexecs.com Re-Engineering The Role and Value of Private Law Librarians Practical Strategies for Leadership in Serving Corporate Clients Susan Hackett | CEO Legal Executive Leadership, LLC 12 July 2014 | AALL 2014 Annual Convention/PLL Segment | San Antonio, TX
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Re - Engineering The Role and Value of Private Law Librarians Practical Strategies for Leadership in Serving Corporate Clients. Susan Hackett | CEO Legal Executive Leadership, LLC 12 July 2014 | AALL 2014 Annual Convention/PLL Segment | San Antonio, TX. - PowerPoint PPT Presentation
Transcript of Susan Hackett | CEO Legal Executive Leadership, LLC
www.lawexecs.com
Re-Engineering The Role and Value of Private Law Librarians
Practical Strategies for Leadership in Serving Corporate Clients
Susan Hackett | CEOLegal Executive Leadership, LLC
12 July 2014 | AALL 2014 Annual Convention/PLL Segment | San Antonio, TX
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The Legal Profession and Legal Services Markets are Changing
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Disruption is not solely a result of the recession…
The recession accelerated and made more visible changes that were already building momentum as a result of:
globalization, advances in information and communication technologies,
client frustration with legal cost and inefficiency, changing leverage and competition, rampant lawyer greed/arrogance
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Because disruption is not solely a result of the recession…
… even as the legal markets recover and improve, it’s likely that the legal profession will continue to struggle: what worked well before probably won’t be what works well
going forward.
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So where should firms focusas they think about responding to change?
While it’s easy to think this is about money – cost, profit and pricing –those are symptoms/results of
dysfunction, not the root cause.
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ADDRESSING THE LONGER TERM CHALLENGES AND PRIORITIES
• Ultimately, the markets will figure out cost/pricing, painful as that may be• What lawyers sell: legal expertise and hours• What clients want to buy: business solutions and efficiency.• Delivering a business result well requires information and knowledge
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AN EXERCISE –
WHAT ARE YOU THINKING ABOUT IN YOUR CURRENT AND POTENTIALLY CHANGING ROLE?
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WHAT IS THE PRIVATE LAW LIBRARIAN’S ROLE?
What is the PLL’s role as your firms / law department clients define it?What would you change if you had 3 strategic wishes?How would you describe the Private Law Library or Librarian’s role in the future?
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LET’S ASSESS WHAT OTHERS ARE DOING …
• How can you deliver what it takes to drive sustainable business and profit in a firm, and distinguishable value in a law department?• How can you leverage the change movement to re-engineer your practice: to increase your value and relevance, improve your role, advance your career?
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Leading Practices For Driving Knowledge Resources and Decision-Making
• Seyfarth• Intel• Cisco• Eversheds
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Firms profit by serving clients w/ knowledge-based processes …
SeyfarthLean Approach and Tools
• Voice of the client• Data-driven decision making• Client-facing project
management• Process mapping• Online client services• Knowledge management• Matter management• Continuous improvement
SeyfarthLean Value
• Clear understanding of client needs and desired outcomes
• Consistent, high-quality legal services
• Increased efficiency• Improved communication and
collaboration• Right-sized staffing approaches• Committed transparent pricing• 15-50% reduction in overall cost of
services
http://www.seyfarth.com/SeyfarthLean
Firm Awards Include:• COLPM Innovaction Award 2012• 2012 ACC Value Champion• BTI Top Tier Service Firm• FT’s 2011 Most Innovative Lawyers (US)
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Departments flourish with knowledge-based processes …
Intel’s Dynamic KM Approach
“We wanted to propel our lawyering to a higher level – in terms of quality, efficiency and lawyer development … we created online tools so that business attorneys can find everything they routinely need to do their jobs, and time spent on mundane and repetitive work could be minimized.”
A Lead KM Lawyer hired to develop systems• Online resources are housed on a wiki, developed/maintained by legal team members• Resources include 24 playbooks used by Intel lawyers and workers to self-serve solutions to common problems. • Proof of Concept Discussion groups – questions posted on Facebook-style pages are answered communally and shared as well as archived.• Client engagement is encouraged with online trainings, quizzes, Social-Text “cocktail parties”
http://www.legalexecutiveleadership.com/resources-networks
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Departments flourish with knowledge-based processes …Cisco Legal’s Global Center of Excellence (GCOE)
Enables the law department to flexibly and rapidly handle matters by moving it to GCOE professionals, who can handle the work based on urgency, more nimbly, and at lower cost.
Using an in-house outsourcing model, Cisco restored (in the first year) more than 19,000 hours of productivity to the rest of the in-house legal team and handled approximately 4,000 transactions—all with very high satisfaction marks.
• Defined activities/transaction types that can be handled in the GCOE• Submitters assign urgency levels: < 2 hrs; 24 hrs; 2-3 days; 1 wk• 26 legal professionals, including lawyers, within the GCOE; 8 locations around the world: San Jose, CA, Lawrenceville, GA, Ireland, The Netherlands, Eastern Europe and India• Technology platform that includes a centralized intake queue and online tools and playbooks to guide GCOE professionals
http://www.legalexecutiveleadership.com/resources-networks
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Firms profit via flexible, multidisciplinary staffing & processes …
Eversheds Agile
“Our own commitment to innovation and to challenging the industry norms underpins everything we do and informs our strategy, vision and values. ... Through constant revision of our service to clients and our management of our own business, and through our own revolutionary approach, we strive to push for further transformation in the legal sector.
Eversheds Agile continues this revolution.”
“A key challenge facing many businesses today is how best to maintain staffing in their teams at optimum levels.
Working closely with clients, Eversheds Agile is a client service that brings together the flexibility of short term staffing and legal resources, with the quality professionals who add value to the client organisation.”
http://www.evershedsagile.co.uk/
Eversheds Agile recognized:• Most Innovative European Law Firm by Financial Times
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Samples of Ideas …
… for how librarians can help their firms develop similar or other
knowledge inspired efforts.
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AN EXERCISE –
WHAT CLIENT SERVICES CAN YOU HELP YOUR FIRM DELIVER THAT WOULD BE PROFITABLE?
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Leading Practice: Customer/Client/Team?
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Leading Practice: Data (metrics) and Tech
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Leading Practice: “Action-ready” solutions
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Leading Practice: Know the client
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Leading Practice: Be Social
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Leading Practice: Increase profitability / reduce burdens on stretched resources
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Examples of knowledge innovation
• Aggressively collect, catalog, and manage data, including big data. Offer it up to clients.
• Create a collaborative knowledge library of firm practices or one that shares clients’ practices. Offer it up to clients.
• “Proof of Concept” Discussions – questions posted online in firm communities are answered communally and archived.
• Assign associates to capture partner knowledge experience as part of their training – catalog it for future training.
• Make knowledge capture a legacy project for elder partners• Create playbooks, process maps, trainings, etc.
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Examples of staffing innovation• Focusing on highest use, not pushing work down• Demand Management Practices – firms and clients• “Captive” work centers to drive down project costs• Design a new kind of “contract lawyer” – you/your team.• Direct client and firm exposure: training, client deep dives,
issue monitoring, etc.• Assist with feeding or writing blogs, Tweets, SocMed –
push knowledge to firms lawyers and clients• Sourcing increasingly sophisticated work to those who do it
faster and cheaper than lawyers
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Thank you for including me in your meeting -
Susan HackettLegal Executive Leadership, LLC
[email protected]+1.301.718.4806 (office) | +1.301.785.5534 (mobile)
@HackettInHouse | @LawExecs
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Some additional slides and thoughts
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A good place to begin is to look at what clients want to buy
• Better management; lean efficiency (two-way)• Certainty / Predictability • Focus on practical outcomes and results• Costs that equate with value received• Outside providers whose business models, staffing and motivations are aligned with the client’s interests
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What law firms need to sell to distinguishtheir services from others’
• Focus on current clients: new work is rare and comes via current clients. • Profitability will not result from increasing hours/rates/activity, but due to
efficiently delivering results better than others can• Hire/train specialized talent at every level in the firm – develop new skills• Harness technologies, work collaboratively on multidisciplinary teams• Invest more in productive workers who are not fee earners, but who help
the firm target, earn & collect more fees. • Capture knowledge and leverage it: focus lawyers on what’s
different in each matter; routinize what’s the same with data, improved process, and applied knowledge .
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Meet Mr. Wonderful [Compliments of V. Mary Abraham]
Mr. Wonderful is a dreamy companion because when you squeeze his chest, he says the most amazing things, like:
“Actually, I’m not sure which way to go. I’ll turn in here and ask directions.”
“Here, you take the remote. As long as I’m with you, I don’t care what we watch.”
“You know, honey, why don’t you just relax and let me make dinner tonight?”
“This football game really isn’t that important. I’d rather spend time with you.”
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Channeling Mr. Wonderful If law firms were to build such a toy to – say – engage in better shared knowledge
practices, their Mr. Wonderful doll might say:
“I’d love to contribute to the knowledge base. What would you like from me?”
“Shift my knowledge from closed files and practice group exchanges to open wikis or blogs? Of course! Why didn’t I think of that?”
“I sure would like to know as much as you know about [fill in the blank legal issue].
“Can you help me to train my team to be effective knowledge leaders?”
“I’d like to lead by example:. What I can do to have the greatest positive impact?”
“Try something new? I’d love to!”
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UNLEASHING THE MR. WONDERFULIN EACH OF US
What is valued is what is measured.What gets measured is what gets done.Seek to provide demonstrable value and measure it.
