The Legal Ops Podcast

Connie, Alex and Elliot discuss the future of legal sourcing including: * The Alternative Legal Service Provider (ALSP) market and its huge growth over the last few years * What to call ALSPs and whether or not the word “alternative” is still appropriate * Why A+ quality legal work is not always required and how to match the right quality of legal work to the right matter * How to unbundle large complex legal matters in order to distribute work to different types of legal service providers * Connie’s view on the most pressing unsolved problems for the legal industry that legal operations and/or legal technology can address * What Connie has been working on since leaving the Corporate Legal Operations Consortium SPONSOR: This episode is sponsored by the ACC, In-House Counsel Day which is coming up in Melbourne on 4 March 2020. Follow the link below and use the discount code ‘TLOP20’ for 10% off your ticket. https://bit.ly/2U1fkjr

Peter, Alex and Elliot discuss the future of legal practice, including: * What skills and competencies will be required in the future by lawyers and other professionals operating in the legal industry * How recent research indicates a dramatic increase in demand for “digital skills”, including in industries outside IT * What depth of expertise in these new skills will be optimal for lawyers, and what this means for the structure of law departments, law firms and legal operations teams * How Peter went from being a projects lawyer to working on “black ops” for an international law firm, and why this was a catalyst for his subsequent career in legal project management and transformation * What the future holds for legal operations and the legal technology market * How all this relates to a 1980s Australian science and technology television show SPONSOR: Checkbox: a no-code automation platform that enables law departments and other teams to easily build workflow and decisioning applications themselves. https://www.checkbox.ai/

Stephanie, Alex and Elliot discuss a wide range of issues relating to legal ops, including: * How Barclays Bank radically transformed the management of its legal panel, resulting in huge benefits both to the bank and to its law firms. * How the bank used data to formulate its strategy and measure the results. * What it means to shift an in-house legal function from being an enabler to a strategic partner. * How the bank included new-law companies in the mix of organisations supplying its legal services. * How Stephanie's background in law firm relationship management set her up for a senior legal ops role at one of the world's largest financial institutions. * What The Bionic Lawyer project is all about. * What the future of legal operations will look like. This will be the last episode of the podcast in 2019. We'll be back in January 2020!

What makes a great law-tech conference? The presentations? The networking opportunities? To what extent does the venue and the dress code matter, or the food and coffee? In this episode Alex and Elliot chat about Elliot’s recent visit to the 2019 Legal Geek conference in London’s East End, including: * the awesome industrial venue for the event * the informal and relaxed vibe * the pros and cons of the fast-paced presentation style that encourages diversity and breadth at the cost of detail With extensive audio from the conference, including a number of interviews with aspiring law-tech vendors, you’ll feel like you’re at the event experiencing it all yourself.

Steven, Alex and Elliot discuss change management in relation to legal teams, covering: * What is change management and why is it necessary? * Are lawyers more difficult to change than other professionals? * The three vital components of an effective change management strategy. * Real-world examples of organisational change that went well, and why. * The state of the legal ops market and what the future will look like.

Mike, Alex and Elliot discuss how to fund your legal operations journey along with your legal department more generally. Mike explains how to track incremental business demand, demonstrate absorption and work with the business to ensure that transformation activities are properly funded and supported. They also discuss the structure of the Legal Operations function at Gap Inc., how Mike became a board member of the Corporate Legal Operations Consortium and why he went surfing after a 15 hour flight from San Francisco to Sydney.

We all know the legal industry is changing; but who are the people leading the change and how are they doing it? Elliot and Alex set the scene and provide their thoughts on the state of the legal ops market. Links Mentioned: CLOC State of the Industry Survey 2019: https://bit.ly/2OTKsOA CLOC State of the Industry Survey 2017: https://bit.ly/2uNV9vj