Articles Posted in Productivity

Earlier I fingered the chief culprit that preserves the status quo, the single most flagrant obstacle to improvement in law department operations: a refusal to stop and think about how work is done (See my post of July 11, 2011: pause and reflect.). If an internal lawyer does that, ten bedrock foundations are available to will improve operations.

1. Push clients to clarify their requirements. Train clients how to request services and what they can do to help get the service (See my post of Feb. 11, 2007: survey data on web forms; March 26, 2007: pros and cons of Requests for Services; Nov. 8, 2009: pluses and minuses of requests for legal services; Nov. 10, 2010: contract intact systems; and Jan. 7, 2010: clients request legal services through an online portal.).

2. Define and differentiate legal services. If work streams in as an undifferentiated blob, no law department can pick out what parts of it to treat differently.

Galileo was forced to recant, but famously muttered the truth. Though often pushed to use other people’s words or to talk about best practices, my protests still echo. Even with my skepticism as expressed on this blog, from time to I refer to some practices as best (See my post of May 28, 2010: conference calls for bidders during an RFP process; Sept. 6, 2010: contract management; Oct. 4, 2010: reserve setting; Oct. 26, 2010: contract signing; Nov. 27, 2010: pool business unit bonus funds; Dec. 7, 2010: oscillating on patent preparation in-house; and May 29, 2011: choice of ECA due date.).

I add these nominees to those of the posts on best practices I have compiled before (See my post of June 6, 2006: best practices with 4 references; and Feb.14, 2009: best practices with 24 references and one metapost.).

A major US insurance company headquartered in Boston has nearly 700 lawyers in 63 field legal offices. Of them, about 120 use WinScribe’s OnDemand “cloud based” digital dictation workflow technology. One out of five is impressive penetration of the productivity tool. I have not seen any other data on even a single law department and the penetration of dictation capabilities (See my post of April 8, 2008: dictating while commuting; May 27, 2008: post-mortem nuggets of learning; Feb. 4, 2009: seven vendors of dictation software or equipment at LegalTech: April 20, 2009: productivity of dictation compared to typing; and Feb. 23, 2008: dictation with 5 references).

This actual example of how many lawyers use a productivity tool – digitized dictation followed by manual transcription – stands out from all the marketing publicity that never gives specifics. The volume of use is impressive in absolute numbers but much more modest when put in terms of documents dictated per week (between 1 and 3). Still, other law departments have a role model for this tool.

What blocks lawyers in legal departments if they want to streamline how their department’s work gets done? It’s not lack of funds, management intransigence, lack of creativity or ideas. Assuming they would like to increase productivity, it’s not the crush of work, the lack of rewards, risk aversion, or barriers to change. No, it’s an unwillingness to step away from the flow of their work and think about how it might be handled more effectively.

That’s it, the long and the short, the summum and the bonum. Simply put, it’s the failure to pause and reflect. If lawyers in legal departments would deliberately, open-mindedly, and creatively stop and think about their input, processing and output, they could bring to bear some of the most basic improvement techniques: A follow-up post explores those core productivity techniques.

A few days ago I had the privilege of speaking during an Exari webinar on contracts and risk management. I discussed a dozen practices that some law departments follow regarding contract management and risk mitigation. If you click on this you can register to hear the recording of the session and obtain the slides.

With a rash of recent metaposts on contracts and how they are managed internally, I thought I should pull together a hyperpost. Here are 12 metaposts – collections of six or more blog posts on a topic – I have assembled, including two on document assembly.

Contracts, see document assembly (See my post of May 5, 2006: contracts with 15 references.).

Contracts II (See my post of Sept. 2, 2009: contracts with 48 references and 1 metapost.).

When an industry standard is established for some technology, as for example smartphones rely on several industry standards, those patents that are deemed “essential” for the standard become subject to different rules. The company that owns an essential patent may be required to license it on a fair and reasonable basis to all comers.

Your company benefits from being crucial to an industry standard, but your patent lawyers may face increased work to meet the demands of licensees. With so-called non-essential patents, by contrast, you can decide whether you want to license them and to whom and on what terms (See my post of April 29, 2011: licensing patents with 9 references.).

Software to help handle contracts – recent references [metapost contract software II 12]

The ubiquity of commercial contract work in legal departments matches the prolixity of software that can help. I have previously collected posts about technology and contracts, but more have accumulated since then (See my post of Nov. 22, 2008: contract management software with 11 references; and June 1, 2010: contract management and software to assist with 10 references.).

Databases and drafting systems predominate in the references but there are also portals, email transfers and analytic tools (See my post of Sept. 21, 2009: offshore database to coordinate contracts; Jan. 7, 2010: clients request contracts through portal (Catholic Healthcare West); Jan. 10, 2010: legal department has contract assembly database; Feb. 19, 2010: automated drafting system at Latham & Watkins; April 20, 2010: software to match contract terms against other parties’; June 29, 2010: Codean’s Visualizer software; Sept. 6, 2010: lessons learned about contract management software; Dec. 17, 2010: Ladbrokes law department licenses its contract management system; April 11, 2011: automatic linkage between contracts and email; April 19, 2011: Fenwick & West offers corporate contracts and documents online; April 25, 2011 #1: law firm provides document creation tools online; and April 29, 2011: Lecorpio offers contract management software.).

In the May 2011 Harvard Business Review, one article (at 85) argues that the biggest roadblock to work productivity is that “People don’t capture stuff that has their attention.” They commit to do something, “but they don’t write it down and it goes into a black hole.” Worse, they don’t determine the goal they want to achieve or the next action to take toward that goal. If you create a list you understand better the lay of your work land, you pick more wisely which task on the to-do list is most important to tackle, and you haul to earth the free-floating anxiety that manifests itself as feeling overwhelmed. “Your head is for having ideas, not holding them.” Workers of the world, create lists!

So, dutifully, I have listed my blog posts on lists (See my post of April 8, 2005: distribute a to-do list after a meeting; April 18, 2005: the power of to-do lists; Nov. 7, 2007: relieve stress with prioritized lists; Jan. 8, 2008: 8 ways to organize tasks to be done; Oct. 10, 2008: tools to help set and follow priorities; Jan. 6, 2011: write down and attack the six most important tasks you face; and June 26, 2008: priorities with 6 references.).

Law departments institute many practices to handle the torrent of contract review, drafting and negotiation. In the past 18 months or so, this blog has cited nearly two dozen practices that deserve consideration.

For several references I have cited the company that was the source of the practice (See my post of Sept. 21, 2009: use offshore staff to keep contracts in order; Jan. 7, 2010: have clients request contracts through a portal (Catholic Healthcare West); Jan. 10, 2010: use a contract assembly database; March 16, 2010: observe nine rules for contract drafting; April 20, 2010: run software that matches contract terms against the other party’s terms; July 15, 2010: treat contracts differently than purchase orders; Aug. 10, 2010: employ contract specialists (Discover Financial Services); Aug. 17, 2010: reduce the number of forms of contracts (Microsoft); Aug. 22, 2010: LG Electronics and solid steps for contract management; Sept. 4, 2010: agree to three priority levels for contracts handled by law departments; Sept. 6, 2010: adeptly use contract management software; Sept. 9, 2010: set up global delivery centers for contracts (IBM); Oct. 28, 2010: clarify approvals and obtain electronic signatures (Cisco); Nov. 17, 2010: reduce the number of form contracts, but with client assent; Nov. 27, 2010: deploy a contract management system (Royal FrieslandCampina); Nov. 29, 2010: set and record limits on negotiation rights; Nov. 29, 2010: focus on five key provisions that need legal review if changed; Dec. 19, 2010: obtain services from law firms for a fixed fee (Bell Canada); Dec. 28, 2010 #2: have a lawyer review every contract; Jan. 24, 2011: understand a framework in which to group your contracts; April 11, 2011: automate linkage between contracts and email; May 25, 2011: maintain a contracting and negotiating guide (Aerojet); and May 31, 2011: require contract request form and procurement’s involvement (eBay).).

In a later post I hope to mine the previous metaposts for more practices (See my post of May 5, 2006: contracts with 15 references; and Sept. 2, 2009: contracts with 48 references.).