Articles Posted in Tools

Bad things.

Yet it’s not uncommon (See my post of Aug. 22, 2006 on the Peter Principal.).

Less coyly, there are a few steps that are possible to ameliorate this predicament. The general counsel can appoint another lawyer in the group to serve as the managing attorney and handle much of the administrative management. The general counsel can empower an office administrator with substantial responsibilities (See my post of April 8, 2005 on replacing an administrator with rotating lawyers; and Aug. 1, 2006 on various titles for the position.). It is even possible for the general counsel to constitute his or her direct reports as managers as a group; dividing among them various responsibilities (See my post of April 8, 2005 on rotating positions of administrative lawyers.). Training and coaching for the general counsel may help, as might 360 degree feedback (See my post of April 14, 2005 on coaches for top lawyers.).

A previous post has defined the term “policy” (See my post of Aug. 26, 2006 while other posts have mentioned specific examples of law department policies: Oct. 29, 2005 on diversity among outside firms; Aug. 31, 2005 on billing policies at the Royal Bank of Canada; Nov. 6, 2005 about Domino and budgets and Dec. 15, 2005 on budgets; Feb. 4, 2006 on e-mail surveillance.).

Compared to formal, written policies, what we call “practices” are simply what goes on, unexamined or directed. A practice is for everyone to store their documents on the H drive, even though no one has stated that expectation or set parameters in a document. Practices just happen; policies are codified and issued.

As explain in InsideCounsel, Oct. 2006 at 30, by Keith Newburry, chief patent counsel at Avery Dennison, the company’s worldwide database “creates a permanent record of every innovation, including the invention’s date and its creator.” The company had about 740 US patents in 2005 (See my post of Feb.1, 2006 for more on the IP management group at Avery Dennison.).

The database standardizes the company’s process to keep track of invention disclosures. It must also help the patent review committee of the company and reduce the amount of paper inundating the intellectual property department (See my posts of Jan. 3, 2006 on patent counsel and the value they deliver; March 8, 2006 on Six Sigma applied to patents at International Truck and Engine; and Nov. 13, 2005 about Motorola streamlining its patent function.).

What do you think of this quote, from the Fin. Times, July 12, 2006 at 3? “Research from analyst Gartner [Group] claims that every hour of professional end-user IT training is worth at least five hours to the business.” Even if the metrics are dodgy, the point is that software and hardware plopped into a law department deserve no huzzahs.

Only if the staff get enough training over time to make reasonably effective use of the tools does the investment start to pay off (See my posts of Aug. 14, 2005 touches on the costs of training when software is installed; April 12, 2006 on percentages spent in the UK on IT training; April 13, 2006 on law firm IT training; June 26, 2006 on why tech projects flounder; and July 14, 2006 on best methods to train corporate counsel on the powers of software.).

It ill becomes this blawgster to bang on about consultants to law departments. Better to mute my own horn. But a panel of consultants tackled the question on every general counsel’s lips: “If consultants add any value, how?”

Bear with me on a some modest suggestions, with contrived examples. A consultant can guide a law department to see its own patch of turf in comparison to the wider field. You may think only of the title “general counsel,” but others bestow the title “chief legal officer.” A consultant has been through it before and can guide your process. Few law departments have conducted a large-scale competitive bid. As a liaison with IT, consultants can translate and mediate for the techies and the lawyers. Extra hands and minds represents another value of consultants; if you want to data mine your e-billing trove, bring in some dedicated consultants who can do the job quickly and right. One more comes to mind, the consultant’s role as bad cop with vendors. Run tough demos and tear apart the contract!

To many readers, this question may seem slam-dunk obvious or overly-intellectualized metaphysics. To them it’s either beyond argument that law departments these days stand taller within companies, have better staff and larger budgets, and are professional peers of their law firm counterparts – all evident signs of progress. Other observers of law departments, pragmatic or uninterested in cerebration, scoff at the value of speculating about something as squishy as “progress.”

Yet I mean the question seriously and regard the answer, or pursuit of the answer, as profound. Are we getting better at management; how do we know?

Managers of law departments have certainly amassed many more tools; they have available many instances of successes and failures in management initiatives; they have seen trends come and go; they have metrics and a sense that management is crucial; they have articles, books, conferences and gatherings galore.

Pulte Homes’s Law Department announced in mid-September that it was the first client to integrate CT’s service of process system with Serengeti’s matter management system. As a registered agent, CT receives and processes a blizzard of legal documents every day. These subpoenas, complaints, and other documents can now be automatically handled by Serengeti’s service of process module. That module routes the CT information to existing matters in Serengeti’s matter management system or creates new matters, and then tracks response deadlines.

This integrative capability is an impressive example of the spread of law department technology. Others come to mind. Matter management systems absorb e-billing (See my post of Aug. 21, 2005 on the overlap.), Board of Directors packages absorb online conferencing and other functions (See my post of Oct. 1, 2006 on BoardVantage), word processing absorbed redlining and style checkers, matter management systems connect with e-mail systems. At this time, however, matter management systems and IP databases have not merged (See my post of May 1, 2005).

Each of these integrations make life easier for the in-house counsel because they collect information more easily, enable more functions with a common look and feel, improve workflow, and more closely resemble the multi-tasking style of in-house lawyers (See my post of June 27, 2006 on portals and references cited.).

If we look at law departments by size in units of 10 lawyers, as in 10 to 20 lawyers, or 20 to 30 and so on, we see typical patterns of additional management activities.

At the 10-to-20 lawyer mark it is as common as not to have a law department administrator (See my post of April 8, 2005 on replacing an administrator with rotating lawyers; and Aug. 1, 2006 on various titles for the position.). In that same size bracket, many law departments install a matter management system (See my posts of Feb. 4, 2006 regarding an award-winning law department that did so; and Sept. 10, 2005 for some myths about the software systems.).

With 20+ lawyers, an increasing number of law departments have their attorneys track time (See my post of Aug. 31, 2005 on the New York City law department.). They also sort out business unit generalists and legal specialists.

A portmanteau capaciously holds many household objects. One analogue in software is a program, BoardVantage, that holds a range of software capabilities. BoardVantage’s eponymous creator has built into the Swiss-knife program its own encryption software, its own email capabilities, its own electronic shredder, its own annotation tool, its own document management, its own conferencing software (like WebEx), and its own survey capabilities (like SurveyMonkey).

Now that’s an awesome array of proprietary software that borrows from many other kinds of software but is all packed together. All of this is in service of Board members securely and easily accomplishing what they need to do (See my posts of Aug. 9, 2006 on the merger of corporate secretary and Board software; and Oct. 1, 2006 on matter management software joined with corporate service-of-process software.).

Cogito, ergo bill.

No, a philosopher would speak learnedly about epistemology — how do we know what we think we know about law department management (See my post of September 22, 2005 regarding what might be our fundamental inability to comprehend such complexity.). A philosopher would Socratically dialogue on ethics – how does a corporate lawyer know what is right and wrong behavior (See my post of March 19, 2006 regarding the fact/value dichotomy.). A philosopher would hold forth on methods of logic and rhetoric – what are the best ways to reason through to the solution to a difficult legal situation (See my various posts under the category of Decisions and Cognitive Styles.). The philosopher’s discourse would touch on metaphysics – why do law departments exist and how came they into existence sub specie aeternitas..

To show all my Descartes, it’s a Locke that general counsel Kant Hegel over philosophical niceties.