Survey: why law departments don’t track more data on outside counsel spend and matters

On a panel at the SuperConference, Steve Williams of the General Counsel Roundtable shared the results of a survey of its members regarding “why law departments shy away from data.” More precisely, why they don’t do as much as they might with matter and invoice data. Here are the responses, with my estimates of percentages from the slides.

“Lack of good technology to track the data” was selected by 68 percent of the respondents. Hard to believe, for me, with the plethora of matter management and e-billing packages available for license. “Lack of time or staff” was selected by 58 percent, a mysterious “lawyers dislike the process” by 48 percent, and “no team or staff to create reports at 38 percent. Presuming this was a multiple choice question, the results are only as good as the choices.

Other choices could have been “Don’t see the value in collecting or analyzing the data” or “Can get the data I need from accounts payable.”