We often hear from our customers and others within the in-house legal community that lawyers feel overworked. In fact, Gartner recently reported that 54 percent of corporate lawyers describe themselves as exhausted. This is of great concern, especially when we consider the implications of their work.
A large reason for this exhaustion is a lack of legal tech tools to empower in-house legal teams. These tools are crucial to handle increasing workloads and ever-changing business/regulatory complexities.
Key Takeaways
- 54 percent of corporate lawyers report feeling exhausted due to overwhelming workloads and a lack of legal tech tools.
- In-house legal teams often lack time to implement technology, relying on piecemeal solutions that don’t fully address their needs.
- New technology trends are emerging to provide connected platforms for in-house legal teams, enhancing efficiency and collaboration.
- Data-driven insights will help legal teams proactively address issues and communicate successes within the organization.
- Implementing holistic legal tech solutions can improve legal team effectiveness and overall company operations.
Time for Tech?
The lack of legal technology is due to several factors. One key factor is that very few in-house lawyers have the time to consider how their department operates. They do not have time to leverage technology and digital processes to expedite workflows. In-house legal teams are often the better option for companies because of the escalating costs of hiring an external law firm. When the in-house lawyers are brought on board, they often find themselves fighting fires. This does not leave much time for them to think about implementing a technology stack. Utilizing this for their team to help increase their effectiveness feels like a luxury. However, you wouldn’t run a sales department or an HR department without fit-for-purpose software. So why should legal be any different?
For a legal team to scale up and work more effectively with ever-increasing workloads, it needs to slow down before it speeds up. When legal teams start to think about software for its function, they also need to think about it from a larger company perspective. They must ask the question: How will this technology enable the entire company to move faster and be better?
Additionally, the legal technology that currently exists in the market has historically provided piecemeal solutions. They sit in one of two camps: solutions that focus on a single component of legal work, such as contract management or external spend. Or, they offer expensive technology that only large corporate teams can justify. As a result, in-house legal teams that have legal technology still lack a holistic, purpose-built solution. It’s needed to empower them to manage workloads and become better service providers across the board.
Future Trends and Adoption
Given all this, it’s not surprising that a new wave of technology is emerging to provide in-house legal with a workspace designed specifically for them. This wave has been driven by several factors, including the acceptance of secure Cloud computing. Additionally, the rise of SaaS enterprise business offerings and the necessity to connect remote working teams contribute.
We strongly believe we will see this emerging as a trend in 2022. An increasing shift/adoption of LegalTech towards connected platforms (vs disconnected point solutions) will provide in-house legal teams with greater abilities. It enables them to own their own interface that connects with the business. This, in turn, connects with their own system of record and workflow tools.
This will drive an additional trend. We’ll see a greater adoption of data-driven insights that provide legal teams with a view over the entirety of their function. This allows the legal team to better drive education, awareness, and proactive risk mitigation through the business, where and when needed. It will also help create greater leverage of existing finite legal resources by allowing legal teams to get ahead of issues. These issues could be costly in the long run and can result in duplication of effort. This data can also be used to report these wins back to the business, creating a virtuous cycle.
Looking forward
Legal is at the heart of most businesses. Therefore, thinking about how to make technology that supports this critical function will have long-term benefits. It will influence how well the company will operate. With respect to legal teams specifically, this includes making it easier for everyone in the business to engage with the legal team. It will improve communications both within the legal team and cross-functionally across the business. This happens while speeding up turnaround times. A more detailed view of the work the team and company are engaging in will also enable any legal team to be more proactive. They can see how the department is functioning and whether it is staffed correctly.
By implementing an end-to-end legal workspace, a legal team can manage its work more efficiently and deliver better services. This allows them to mature their operations further. Holistic solutions, rather than siloed technology, are best positioned to provide these outcomes for in-house legal teams.
The desire and the demand for in-house legal teams to have purpose-built systems is real. The need for a team to have a legal workspace that enables them to communicate both cross-functionally and with their colleagues is crucial. It helps in dealing more efficiently with increasing workloads, and this need has never been greater.
