Elevating Legal Ops: Strategic Tech Adoption in the Insurance Sector

Thank you.

Sure. So I support a team of about seventy lawyers and other legal and compliance professionals, and our team or department supports the US property and casualty operations of Munich Re America.

Yes.

Connie and Jeff have done for running Connie and Jeff have done for running legal like a business is aligning legal with the business. And so what Elaine Darr of DHL and I shared with the audience is how to develop a business aligned strategic plan. And we took it from the corporate vision, mission, values, initiative, SWOT analysis, and then couple that with what the department has, either if they have vision and mission or if they go straight to a SWOT and then developing strategic initiatives that are quantifiable.

And so you have kind of an OKR or objectives and key results approach so that we're tying the work of the department expressly to how the business talks and what the business needs.

Yes. Well, not just lawyers, but about thirty five lawyers in the balance, other professionals.

Some of us don't like being measured in the way that sales or marketing might be. And so what Elaine and I shared was here are ways to take the strategic initiatives. So if that's the objective, and then you align those with the key results or what we're gonna do.

So for example, if a team needs a regulatory change management tool, a horizon scanning tool because they need to know what the laws and regulations in the different jurisdictions that they operate in, are they changing? Are they evolving? What's happening?

Could we put a deadline on that? Where okay. If our current tool is gonna sunset in fourth quarter, we should probably map backwards and figure out, hey. We need some viable candidates by q two.

We need to complete the demos by q three. We need to have a recommendation together with either procurement or finance or the business, if appropriate, to the CLO by a certain date. So dates are one way, Eric, to have the measurable quantifiable aspect of the key results for lawyers who aren't used to that, or you can talk about a percentage of process efficiency. Or if your department uses a lot of outside counsel, the spend, contract cycle time.

There are things that are at the fingertips of our peers

But they just may not have had the experience or the tools to make those into OKRs or key results. And so legal operations can help the leadership of the department introduce that concept and then talk the language of the business.

Yes. I don't know if you were sitting in on the session yesterday that Elaine and I shared, but what's interesting about your question is we look at it along a continuum. So when you're focused on the aspirational parts as I'm listening to your question, that's really the potential vision and mission statement and values of the department to define who they are, who we are, and who we want to be for the business. That's where the lofty would come in and it's very helpful and it helps align the legal department with the business again by having the strategic initiatives that are clear.

So those are the objectives. So for example, if there were a company that was in their discount grocery space and they had to expand by acquisition and also building new stores, the cycle, the pace of all the contracts and agreements would be a very important part of that success. So the legal department could look at and see, do we have workflow automation? Do we have CLM or other tools?

And if not, then the objective, for example, could be to speed the cycle time of these agreements.

The key result would be we want to automate a certain percentage, we want to speed it by x number of days or weeks, and then, you know, by when. And so what Elaine and I shared was you can take it from the corporate goal of this expansion to the department initiative. I'll just switch language with you. That's the okay.

We need to accelerate the time. And then we identify a team to execute it. So we give opportunity to people in the department, whether they're informal leaders or high potential people. How do we tap them?

And then are there business partners that we need to join or stakeholders?

And then do what by when? And then the key to help the general counsel, because we're always thinking about how we align our leaders with the business leaders, is then if we follow the process that we shared, you come out with a quarter by quarter ability to report on progress in quantifiable ways, percentages, timeline, dollars, and use a stoplight, red, yellow, green, are we on track? Then they can communicate to their sales peer or the CEO or if it's up to a CLO, here's how we're doing on accelerating the contract. Here's how we are adding value to the business.

Yeah. And so this is a really entertaining position to be in kinda it's like an appellate argument where the justices are arguing Yeah. With each other for me about OKRs. So I can see that you guys have had this conversation with us. We have a few debates.

An adopt or adopt or die. Yeah. I mean, that's really the way that I look at it as well.

Yeah. So the insurance sector or industry is surprisingly interested in and paying attention to technology. So if you this may be another podcast episode with other guests, but the whole field of InsurTech and how they are incorporating and leveraging cutting edge technology. You have a lot of digital first or AI first insurers.

So as an industry, that's some may resemble that remark, Eric, but not everyone. And so for our department, there are a lot of people who are tech savvy, lawyers and others. So it doesn't fit the mold or the stereotype that you shared. But to bring it back to the first part of your question, when I'm on the exhibit floor, when I see the vendors who I may or may not have spoken with before the conference or generally aware of their products, looking at what our use cases and needs are and not try to find the application of all the tools.

So one layer is budget To think about what's possible. And we could recommend something that we think is going to be critical or improve in a material way. So So along the continuum of, can we solve it with an existing tool in our toolbox at work? And there are some great sessions still to come this week about how to use what might already be in your toolbox. So start there or figure out, here's our use case and then build it and talking to your department peers and also the business to say, hey. Here's a tool that we think would help us, whether it's advance the cycle time or to be a better aware of the legal and regulatory change management. So that's the process.

And I also acknowledge what you were talking about, Eric, with the focus on the shiny new object. And for the past three years, if you're not talking about AI, you're perceived as behind the times. And so in insurance, there may be some carriers who are old school and like their spreadsheets and paperwork. But I tell you, there are a lot of people across the industry, some of whom have attended conferences like this, but you could identify probably at every carrier someone who's forward thinking, whether they're a digital leader, transformation leader, claim leader, legal leader. They're looking for ways to integrate the technology to serve their customers. So much like the department wants to serve the business, I know that the industry or the vertical is very much wanting to accelerate that.

I was grateful for the opportunity that Jeff and Connie gave Elaine and me just to share what we've done in the past and what could help each other. And that ties in, Daniel, I think to one of the key benefits here is there's a growing number of peers in the community across legal ops dot com or running legal like a business. And I've found that the sessions are more impactful and I hear from more of my peers and I'm able to focus on that community.

And there may be other experiences where that isn't always or at least as consistently the case.

It's probably gonna be a time delay, Daniel, in the sense that I need to digest like, I've I've received, and now I need to digest and see, okay. This may be applicable to one team or one person to be able to share. Others require a little bit more thought that if I'm going to propose it to the CLO, hey, saw this great thing, I'm going to need some backup or context for that. So the process is digest once you're back to the office, collect some thoughts, and then to be able to share maybe some highlights to test if there's more interest or to drive focus and not from the session that Elena and I did, but for a strategic planning perspective. What are those things, comments, new information that I could contribute and offer for discussion?

Let it settle.

Be careful. Be mindful. And then put together your business case or your solution set.

I'm not surprised that that was your answer given your love of OKRs and how you've implemented them. So I'm not surprised to hear that you're very methodical about that, and I agree that taking the time to think is at a premium. It's almost out of scarcity these days.

I believe that's why GCs and CLOs want and appreciate legal operations support because they've got everything coming at them. And if you can be a wise counselor to them and have not take forever, but if you can have that thoughtful response, that's value add.

Thank you.