The Legal Ops Podcast

Legal automation is a hot topic. If your firm or department is not already investing, it will almost certainly be on your roadmap. And who better to discuss this with than Evan Wong, the co-founder and CEO of legal automation company Checkbox AI? In a wide ranging and highly practical discussion, Evan, Alex and Elliot covered: * why legal teams should be investing in automation * how to build a business case for automation * how to get started, practically * applying lean principles to project development * why building an automation system is like building a start-up * how to balance risk reduction against system complexity * how to measure success * the future of legal operations LINKS Checkbox website: https://checkbox.ai/ Evan Wong on LinkedIn: https://au.linkedin.com/in/theevanwong

In this episode of The Pulse, Alex and Elliot discuss Apple's recent banning of Fortnite from the iOS App Store and the resulting lawsuit by Fortnite's creator, Epic Games. As with Apple's banning of the Hey.com email app, accusations of abuse of monopoly power have again been brought against Apple, only this time Apple's adversary is a huge, well capitalised company. Alex and Elliot discuss how things could play out, and how this situation compares to a shopping mall where the owner leverages its position to extract above market rents. They also cover Alex's recent flight from the USA to Australia, what it was like to travel internationally during the pandemic and how Alex's experience has been in mandatory hotel quarantine.LINKSPicture of Fornite's in-game currency purchase screen: https://cdn.vox-cdn.com/uploads/chorus_asset/file/21757364/epic_direct_pay_apple_app_store_2045x979_730033169.png

In this episode of The Pulse, Alex and Elliot chat with Stevie Ghiassi, CEO and co-founder of Legaler and former president of the Australian Legal Technology Association. Stevie is one of the brains behind the Global Legal Tech Report and was able to answer a bunch of questions that Alex and Elliot mused in the previous episode of The Pulse. They also discussed a number of Stevie's "side hustles", including the upcoming Global Legal Tech Directory and his project aimed at creating a set of common standards for legal tech. Finally, Stevie gave his view on coronavirus and how it’s impacting the legal tech market. LINKS Global Legal Tech Report website: https://www.globallegaltechreport.com/

So you want to invest in legal technology, but where do you start? In this two-part series you’ll hear from Alex and Elliot who together have a wealth of experience sourcing, selecting and implementing legal technology for both large and small corporate legal departments. They share practical tips while walking through the following stages that will help ensure you choose the right solution: (1) Defining the problem - a practical framework for establishing and justifying the need, contextualising the problem and developing a problem statement. (2) Rent, buy or build? - is this something you can build yourself using existing enterprise systems already available to you? What are the pros and cons of each option? (3) How to find the right tech - with over 4,000 legal technology vendors globally, it’s easy to be overwhelmed. Should you choose an integrated or point solution? Legal specific or enterprise? Where can you go to find the best tech? How do you make the most out of product demos? (4) RFP, RFI, RFQ - what are the differences and what is the best option for your scenario? In Part 2 Alex and Elliot will share practical tips on the fun part - implementation!

In this episode of The Pulse, Alex and Elliot discuss the Corporate Legal Operations Consortium’s annual State of the Industry survey results. They covered what was surprising and not so surprising about the results and discussed what trends could be contributing to changes in the industry. They also discussed Google’s announcement to create a "new integrated workspace experience" by combing a number of their products into one place. Alex shares how this will dramatically improve his work day while Elliot shares his healthy skepticism. LINKS CLOC 3rd Annual State of the Industry Survey: https://cloc.org/blog/cloc-announces-the-results-of-their-3rd-annual-state-of-the-industry-survey/ G Suite video: https://youtu.be/4Cslvqi38eI

In this episode of The Pulse, Alex and Elliot discuss the Global Legal Tech Report, including what it is, who it's for and some of its findings. They also cover the recently announced update to Microsoft Teams which adds two intriguing features: Together Mode, which uses avatars to simulate being physically together, and Dynamic View, which promises a better way to deliver group presentations virtually. They also provide a brief follow up to the Hey.com story discussed in the previous episode, and they chat about recent coronavirus developments in Chicago and Melbourne. LINKS You download the app and it doesn’t work: https://youdownloadtheappanditdoesntwork.com/ MS Teams update video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A1egcVkYrgw&feature=youtu.be

Steven, Alex and Elliot discuss the challenges presented by the COVID-19 pandemic for legal operations, particularly relating to business continuity. They cover: * The history of legal operations, how it has matured as a discipline and the influence of groups such as CLOC and the ACC * Permanently mobile workforces, the challenges this creates and how to maintain personal relationships and connections in a physically separated working environment * Whether or not paper is "dead", and how the pandemic has affected this trend * The extent to which corporates should be concerned about their law firms' business continuity strategies and procedures * Why change management is more important than ever * The importance of data and metrics, both to assess the impact of disruption and to help with planning for future events * Steven's views on the future of legal operations and why collaboration, integration and data will play a key role LINKS Steven O'Donnell on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/stevenodonnell1 Mitratec's Business Continuity Transformation Center: https://mitratech.com/business-continuity-transformation-center/

In this episode of The Pulse, Alex and Elliot chat about Hey, a new email service from the Basecamp software company. Hey has been described as the most innovative take on email since Gmail launched in 2004. However the focus of the episode is not on Hey itself, but on the controversy surrounding Apple's rejection of the app from the iOS App Store. Basecamp's CTO compared Apple's behaviour to the mafia, Microsoft's chief legal officer raised serious antitrust concerns and some US politicians have questioned whether Apple is abusing the monopoly that it created over access to iOS. Alex and Elliot discuss all these issues and suggest how they could be addressed in the future, including through the creation of a competing app store for iOS. LINKS Hey website: https://hey.com/ TheVerge's review of Hey: https://www.theverge.com/2020/6/15/21286466/hey-email-basecamp-price-availability-platforms-launch

In this episode of The Pulse, Alex and Elliot chat about Alex's new AirPods Pro and the recent integration deal between Slack and AWS. Then they discuss law firms expanding into new lines of business, why they have historically been slow to do this and what types of businesses it would make sense for law firms to consider. LINKS Australian Financial Review article: https://www.afr.com/companies/financial-services/we-are-redefining-the-law-firm-says-minterellison-boss-20191202-p53g6b

Alex and Elliot discuss the recently released 2020 ACC Legal Operations Maturity Benchmarking Report, including:* What type of companies and legal operations departments are represented in the report * What competencies are included in the ACC's legal operations maturity model and how the model compares to CLOC's equivalent model * What the report identifies to be the competencies with the highest and lowest average maturities across all responding companies * How the overall maturity of legal operations departments correlates with organisational size and scale * Which industries have organisations with higher legal operations maturity, and potential reasons for the reported results * How particular competencies are defined and the average rating of all companies in those competencies * Whether the research behind the report is measuring true operational maturity and, if not, what else it might be measuring LINKS Link to the report: https://bit.ly/3dyZl2Y