Running Legal Like a Business

Thank you so much, Daniel and Eric. I am thrilled to be here talking about legal ops, legal technology, AI, legalops.com. I could not be more thrilled.

I think that's a really good question. So I would say when I think about legal operations, I think about legal operations as the strategic arm to the legal department.

And I think a lot of people would think about it as the operational arm to the legal department, which is in essence true. But we are the ones that help strategically drive the department alongside the GC.

We help to ensure that the department runs like a business, ensure that the department is data driven, ensure that we've got the KPIs we need, the technology that we need. But I think that legal operations is the strategic arm of legal. I think that legal operations is part of the competitive advantage that helps drive the legal department to be all that it can be. Oh, my goodness. Now we're recruiting people for something more than legal operations.

But I think I really do think that legal operations is growing and evolving. And I'm hoping that this hopeful shift drives us more to strategically driven legal operations.

Yeah. I am absolutely happy to. So I think it's an interesting angle. And I could tell you that strategy means one thing to everyone, and I don't think that it does. I think so much of where you strategize within your legal department and how you strategize within your legal department is based on the maturity of your legal department and the maturity of your legal operations function. And as you start to look at where do I begin and how do I evaluate and how do I improve and where do we look for efficiencies?

It's just not uniform. And I don't think that it can be. And so I'll give you an example. I'll speak to my experience at Belron.

So I think that we were a strong yet somewhat immature legal department when I joined. Wildly good talent, such smart people, really good lawyers, yet we lacked process and we lacked technology and we lacked a little bit of the strategy around the legal department. And we have a very forward thinking global general counsel. And so alongside her, we were able to say, what does the legal department have and what does the legal department need?

Well, when we sat down and thought about it, we actually didn't have some of the basics of what a business, if you will, has. We didn't have mission, vision, values. We didn't have KPIs. We didn't have set strategic priorities.

We weren't measuring against those types of things. We didn't have a north star if you will that our legal department could follow and be guided by even when they get caught up in the day to day which we all do almost every day and so what we had to sit down and do was say how do we guide this legal department in the right direction under the right circumstances with the right parameters and so we actually started by building a legal purpose who are we and where are we headed and then we went on to say okay well what behaviors drive us towards that purpose and what behaviors should we be exhibiting?

And then we went a step further and say, well, how do we actually visualize that within our legal department? How do we create this rich picture, if you will, that someone could have up and say, I know exactly where our legal department is headed. I know exactly what I should be focusing on. And so I know what that doesn't answer your question, but I will get there.

But that's kind of how we started. And then what we did is we said, how do we measure ourselves against those things? Are we actually keeping up with our KPIs? Are we actually going with our priorities?

Are we doing these things in the day to day? And that's where I started having conversations with our various leaders to say, how are you executing? How can I support you? Look at this technology that I've seen.

Who can I speak with about the various processes that are going on within your organization?

And we've started to create a bit more of a community, if you will, within our legal department, where we say we're going to bring people together for working groups. We're going to bring leaders together to talk about some of these things that we're tracking against. We're going to bring subcommittees together, which I typically hate, but to talk about how do we get to this next step and what does it mean to actually meet these goals? And so it felt counterintuitive to everything I know how to do, which is run. Right? I know how to run and I know how to excel and I know how to deliver, but to actually stop and really think about the strategy and not only about it, but how to embed it within a legal department took a muscle that I don't think we have all flexed all that much recently.

It's a really good question, and it's probably one of the biggest challenges that I think we face as legal leaders and legal operations leaders more specifically.

It takes time. I always used to use this example of microdosing and how you microdose your legal department. You know, if you've got a peanut allergy, you have a little bit of a peanut at a time. You don't have that anaphylactic reaction to technology or change.

And so I've used that kind of throughout my career. And we've also been really open with our law department around what will change look like? What will it feel like? How will you experience it?

So for us, it's been a journey and it's been a slower journey. You know, I want everything to happen month one, day one, week one, and things are happening at year one and, you know, year one and a half. But what we've done is we started small and we started easy. We started with just a conversation with me.

Tell me all your woes. What goes well? What doesn't go well? What's the thing that makes you not wanna come into the office because it's such a headache to work on?

And then from there, we started to make a list. We said, alright. Well, we've got we've got what goes well. We got what doesn't.

What now? Let me start it to bring people together for short, brief trainings. And we said, this is what Copilot looks like. This is what AI looks like.

This is what technology can look like in a more well established or a more advanced legal department. Maybe we get there one day, but this is just what it looks like. So we're just laying the foundation brick by brick.

And then we would get into conversations around this is what strategy looks like. This is what process improvement looks like. But it was bite sized pieces. We didn't shove everything at them at once.

We didn't shove everything on them at once. And then we started going region by region. I'd go to the U. S.

Office and say, you know, this is what it looks like and this is what we're doing. Is anyone interested? And we would take those volunteers. And that was our starting point.

We weren't forcing anyone. And so if someone was willing to raise their hand and say, I'm willing to get outside of my comfort zone, I'm willing to try technology, I'm willing to try AI, I'm willing to do something different. They became our mouthpiece. They became our one that was then willing to have the conversations on our behalf.

But it takes time and it's the hockey stick, right, or a tipping point. And I actually just told my GC six weeks ago that we hit the tipping point. Fourteen months after I joined, we hit a tipping point where I was no longer selling myself and other team members were selling my services, if you will, to others within the legal department. But it was very much a one piece of technology, one conversation, one training, and it was this almost tie trading of information and technology and process to our legal department.

And one last thing is we didn't tackle everything at once even though I desperately wanted to and so we would go out and say here's information now we need something from you. Here's technology. Now we need something for you. So we actually did this thing called right task person, which, Eric, I think you alluded to a little bit.

Is there someone better suited to do this? Does it fit better somewhere else? And it wasn't a six week effort, and it was terrible. It was Excel based.

We made them track all of their matters and all of the different tasks that they were doing. I was enemy number one, but they got to the end of that six weeks, and they went, I would look at my list and give myself a pat on the back for how much work I had done. Or I looked at my list and realized someone asked me the most experienced lawyer here in this country to clean a pantry. And I did it.

And so it was just this interesting realization of, like, look at what we're doing and yet look at what we're doing. But the only reason we were able to do that is because we spent the nine months prior little by little building them up to a point where they realized I'm not gonna ask them to do something that's completely unnecessary. I'm not gonna shove technology at them that isn't needed, and we're not gonna change for the sake of change. We're gonna do it when it makes sense and where it makes sense and where it's going to be most effective for the business.

I love that question. And it's a good devil's advocate question. Right? Because it's really easy to say, like, we're legal.

We're special. We're unicorns. We do all these amazing things. How dare you? Which I would never say.

But I do think actually, I wanna ask you a question, Daniel. The company that you work for, when was the last time you looked at the mission, vision, values? And when was the last time that you were like, this is gonna impact my daily work and I can't wait to look at it tomorrow and I'm gonna make sure I'm following it to a tee?

I absolutely have asked the wrong person, and I should have known that based on the wall decor we talked about and all of the, you know, the core words that you really thrive with. But you're right. I don't think that's the norm. And we actually Belleron has an incredibly strong culture.

We have very clear mission vision. We have very clear values. We have a very clear leadership framework. And it is prolific throughout our organization.

And our culture is what people come to Belleron for. It's one of the things that within our hiring makes us unique. But I don't think our lawyers, that I don't think they look at that and think about that every day. And I think part of it is some of it is specific to them.

But there is something deeper, I think, that lawyers resonate with. So I'm gonna talk about our behaviors for just a minute. We talk about being trusted, and we talk about providing this unique service, this trusted partner aspect. And for whatever reason, that resonates with lawyers.

Right? Being that trusted provider, providing that trusted advice, being that person that the business comes to when they need something, when they're in that critical moment that I don't think is often captured within a company's mission, vision, values. However, I will say I think most BUs, if they don't, should do this type of exercise because you should be guided by your company values and you should be guided by your company mission vision. But then how do you take it that one step further to make it real and tangible for your law department?

Legal departments can go beyond their company mission, vision, values and take it and make it tangible for their lawyers. What does it mean to be in sales for you? What does it mean to be caring and driven and all of these other things? And how does that actually apply to a lawyer in our specific law department?

And I think that specificity is something that's special and unique, and I think it drives lawyers more than just a company mission, vision, values.

Well, if I miss something, you let me know, and I'll always add to it. But I think you're right. For the longest time, the job has always been to protect the house and how do we ensure the house is protected and how we ensure the people in the house are safe and that it's well run. But I think that we as legal professionals and as lawyers can do more.

And that's where we actually become true partners to the business. And I'll give you some tangible examples to that. We have a technical arm of our organization, and that technical arm is one of legal's biggest partners within the organization. So as they start to say, we want to do this better, faster, differently, but we know there's a legal element to it.

We come to the table with the lawyer, with the legal element, and then I come to the table alongside it to say, yeah.

That's great. That's legally sound. Follow what he says. But, also, let's add in AI here.

Let's add in some automation here. Here's how we can actually use legal technology to solve your problems. And I think that's part of what maybe you're alluding to Eric is technology in general can be used in almost any department and we're starting to look at how do we enable our legal department to be better faster stronger with the use of AI while also comforting them that AI is not gonna take what they're doing. It's gonna enhance what they're doing.

It's gonna make them to be able to focus on that work of substance, not that work that's a manual repetitive nature.

And I think beyond is an interesting place that I've not spent a lot of time thinking about right now because we're so entrenched in the now. But when I think about what comes next it's do we have the right mix of people on the team? Do we now need a data scientist? Do we now need an AI specialist? Do we need different types of technology? Do we have the right mix of talent?

And if we do, do we have that talent doing the right things with the right technology? I don't ever want a lawyer negotiating an NDA again. Right? I don't ever want someone creating RIF documents for an HR department that automation can create.

I don't ever want our PA to take a birthday from an Excel sheet and put it into an email and prep or put it into an Outlook so that it's on a calendar so that a GC can write an email to say happy birthday. Like, no. Never again. There's technology to do all of these things.

But it's how do we actually get to the point of pure and true automation within AI backdrop that then allows our attorneys to be that partner that not only protects the house, but then looks at, well, what's the next house and how do we buy the block? And can we have that whole city and really start to be that forward thinking proactive partner, not the reactive protect the house partner?

I go to conferences because I wanna learn. I wanna network and I wanna walk away with something tangible.

And I can't afford to be up all night and come back more tired than when I got there. And so being at a conference where I know exactly what I'm gonna get and the value it's gonna provide for content and networking and things like that is a huge and important value to me.

Now from an AI strategy perspective, I think that there is this ecosystem movement that's happening because there is so much technology and there is so much evolution in the technology space that we have to create almost these subgroups of professionals that can say, have you tested this? Do you know this? What you do for this AI problem? Because there's too much technology for any one person to be able to keep up with on their own.

I've demoed seventy nine technologies in the last eleven months, and I can't keep pace with legal technology. And I don't know a lot of other people that are demoing that much technology. If I can't keep pace, I don't know how anyone is. And so being able to come to an event like this and being able to say, what have you looked at and what have you tested? And oh, these seven AI providers are here. I'm going to talk with not only my colleagues, my peers, but also these providers about what they're seeing in the ecosystem and how we start to build that strategy. I think it's a really unique piece of legalops dot com because they create that environment, that perfect environment to be able to have those conversations.

Just from a quick, very specific strategy perspective, I think one of the most challenging things that we're trying to solve for our law department right now is how do we take a fragmented law department where countries have autonomy and regions have autonomy and a group has some authority, but also some autonomy. And how do we start to bring that together? How do we bring it together from a cohesiveness perspective, a technology perspective, a document and process perspective? And is there some kind of AI technology out there that can help us to solve all this?

And is it a point solution, or is it a wider solution? And what does that look like? And I don't think that I've solved that yet. And I think that heading to RLLB in just a short amount of time now, my goal is to sit with my peers and to sit with others that I've not spent time with before and to sit with these different providers and say, what are you doing in this space and how can you help me think through this?

You're absolutely right. I mean, it's the game changer. It's something I play with every single day, multiple times a day.

I highlighting new ones all the time because it is changing and it is ever evolving, but it's also progressive. I think it's progressive in learning, us and it. And we are so far from whatever the final or even more advanced version of AI is. I mean, it's new versions are coming all of the time, and yet I don't think we'd even begin to imagine all that it's going to solve one day.

The idea of the worst of AI is here. The best of it is to come. Yeah.

Obviously, if anyone wants to, they're more than welcome to reach out to me. I think Connie Brenton is the mother of all things legal operations, so obviously more than welcome to reach out to her. And the conference is this year, September second through the fifth in Las Vegas. So hopefully, we'll be able to see some people there.

Of course.