Investing in New Technologies

Legal technology available to companies has greatly improved over the last decade to meet this new demand. While older technology required companies to dramatically change their processes to align with how the software was designed and operated, newer technology is more flexible. Today's software can be configured to specifically adhere to a company's operational needs, rather than the other way around.

In-house counsel, therefore, is understandably dropping archaic software and turning to these newer technologies to propel them in a more efficient direction. With access to advanced machine learning and searching capability, in-house attorneys and staff also can gather and analyze information more quickly. Accessing such big data services provides valuable insight into legal and business trends. Decisions once based largely on subjective information can now be informed and substantiated by data.

Data Takes Center Stage

Connie Brenton is co-founder of Corporate Legal Operations Consortium (CLOC) (www.cloc.org), a non-profit association of legal operations executives sharing best practices and driving guidelines, process, and innovation. She explains, “Corporate executives expect the GC's office to be a business counselor to the firm, and to discuss numbers, data and analytics. Efficiency is now essential for legal departments, and this has advanced software's role and accelerated technology adoption.”

Jeremiah Chan, Legal Director, Global Patents at Google, also is seeing more technology embraced by the GC's office, pointing out notable changes in the management of intellectual property (IP) law. Chan has observed “drastic changes in the way corporate legal is leveraging technology, particularly concerning in-house patent departments. With patents in particular, we're on the verge of a data revolution due to the convergence of two things: the availability of data and major improvements in analytical tools. Now, any IP department can harness the power of data in ways never before possible.”

Chan explains that the desire for good data is prompting corporate legal departments to hire people with new skillsets, like database administrators (DBAs) to organize the data and data scientists to extract insights. “Legal departments now demand clean data, made possible by automated tools that verify and validate it. The more you can give companies access to clean data, the more they can do with it. There is an enormous quantity of data available, but it needs to be clean. For example, in IP, the U.S. Patent & Trademark Office releases tons of trademark and patent data in bulk for anyone to access. You can use all of this data to your advantage and increase transparency, but first you must ensure that the data integrity is intact.”

Dana Rao, Vice President, Intellectual Property and Litigation at Adobe, explains that data is important, but analyzing the data is equally crucial. He says most in-house counsels are now operating within a corporate environment that is dependent on analytics. “At Adobe, we sell a data analytics solution. Our corporate strategy is based on the usefulness of data analytics, especially for marketing departments, and so it only made sense for us to focus on doing the same for legal.”

Essential Tech for Corporate Legal

In addition to gathering and analyzing data, the GC's office needs to modernize old systems and leverage new tools as well. Often, a good strategy is to replace, when possible, or integrate legacy products with new systems that can be tailored to fit the department's specific needs.

Many useful technologies can benefit corporate legal including the following categories:

E-billing is “foundational technology” according to Brenton, “because it tracks spending ' particularly for outside counsel fees ' and integrates all the financial data in one place.”

Contract management can be very useful. Tracking important contract terms and conditions has always been crucial, but ensuring accurate information is consistently entered has been problematic. Contract management software deftly steps in, automating the creation and tracking of contracts and their content. Turnaround time for review and execution improves, dates are not missed, relevant information is accurately recorded and lawyers have fewer “touches” to consume their time.

Document management was once a task that either soaked up large amounts of in-house resources or was outsourced. But with the latest technology, organizing documents is easier than ever.

E-discovery technology, such as electronic document collection and review, is helping identify discoverable documents, transforming a historically, manually intensive and expensive process into an efficient litigation document management service.

E-signature software speeds document execution. At Adobe, Rao finds that Adobe's own Adobe Sign functionality has helped them accelerate the patent filing process. While getting signatures from inventors on patent documents used to slow the process down by weeks, implementing e-signature technology built right into PDFs allows Adobe to collect the necessary signatures in a matter of days.

Brenton also points to e-signature software as incredibly helpful for tactical contracts such as non-disclosure agreements (NDAs). She says, “It is no longer acceptable to have 20-year veteran attorneys working on something as low-risk and high-volume as NDAs. Instead, these kinds of tasks are being converted to a self-serve model, where the sales team creates its own NDAs, pre-signed by the General Counsel.”

Dashboards are definitely trending upward in corporate legal. Such analytics technology aggregates data from various sources and presents the information in a centralized, visual interface. Legal departments then are able to react and operate more efficiently by relying on such aggregated real-time information.

IP management and analytics solutions are transforming the management of intellectual property portfolios. Companies can integrate many of the capabilities described above as well as enhance and automate their workflow processes to gain more insight into their IP portfolio's strengths and weaknesses and enhance the business relevance of their IP. Further, they can track various key operational metrics to improve efficiencies in their department.

Convincing the C-Suite to Invest in Tech

Even though these technologies are exciting and brimming with promise, when the issue of investing in technology is on the table, corporate decision-makers must see a clear return on investment. Rao says it comes down to this: “Are you making processes more efficient so people can spend more time on high-value tasks, rather than redundant, non-fulfilling parts of their jobs? When making a case, make sure your points can be proven.”

Chan advises doing your homework first, to lay the groundwork for future success. “Before buying technology, figure out the user stories ' how will your team members actually use the data and for what purpose? Is there a clear way to make the data 'actionable'? If you get a mountain of data, it can be quite overwhelming, and most attorneys won't know what to do with it. That's why you need data experts who know how to extract insights and figure out how to leverage the data for particular business goals.” He proposes a measurable approach, recommending that companies define their criteria for success up-front. “Here's the goal, here's the data. Then, based on the data, make informed decisions to achieve those goals.”

When the time comes to show the return on investment for the technology purchased, Rao admits, “It's rare that someone says to us, 'Show me how many man-hours have been saved by this tool,' but I do send positive feedback to management about employees who are satisfied with the solutions. Our management is invested in keeping employees happy so I like to show how much happier the employees are after a change to a new tool, as at least one way of showing that ROI.”

Inviting Outside Counsel to Work More Efficiently

Most corporate legal departments rely on outside counsel to provide various aspects of legal services. The proliferation of the use of data to improve operational efficiency impacts them as well, since they are extensions of the GC's office. If law firms are performing well, the client knows, but if the firm's performance is deficient, the client knows that, too.

Brenton says she gathers data to closely examine the percentage of spend in-house versus using outside counsel. “We measure everything now and outside counsel spend is a big focus. We can capture 'best in class' metrics about legal spend to see if we are above or below target numbers. For outside counsel firms, we are requiring more alternative fee arrangements such as fixed and capped fees, anything other than hourly billing.”

At Google, Chan explains, “We're trying to motivate outside counsel to become better service providers by using the data to increase transparency.” However, he predicts that even though the law firms' adoption of new technology may take a long time, corporate legal departments are no longer waiting for them. “There is a lot of tension surrounding these issues. Law firms have developed tried and tested practices over decades, and now there's an opportunity to develop areas of legal practice that will future-proof the industry and drastically improve efficiency.”

As corporate legal departments forge ahead in their quest for more efficiency and cost-effectiveness, they are fortunate to have access to the latest developments in technology, data and analytics. Software and services that offer rich functionality, flexibility in configuration and a verifiable return-on-investment will be essential allies to the GC's office in the years ahead. Law firms will be challenged to pursue similar streamlined processes, like their clients, to demonstrate their own efficiency. This will allow some firms to differentiate from other firms that are more reluctant to adopt technology and new approaches to servicing their clients. Much progress has been made in legal technology, but more exciting territory still lies ahead. Many GCs' offices today, like those mentioned in this article, are truly in pioneer mode, striking out to discover new possibilities and breaking through old boundaries on a daily basis.

Doug Luftman is chief innovation officer and general counsel at Lecorpio, an intellectual property (IP) management and analytics software solutions company. He may be reached at [email protected], or on LinkedIn: www.linkedin.com/in/dougluftman.