Do You Outsource Legal Work? If Not, You May Be in the Minority.

When compared to a majority of business professionals, lawyers aren’t lemmings. While many professionals may chase the shiniest new trends or toys, risk-adverse lawyers prefer to thoroughly evaluate options.

According to a new survey, after years of talking about legal process outsourcing, in-house lawyers are now actually embracing it. The LPO study, conducted by Corporate Counsel, discovered that more than half of the respondents 1.) have outsourced legal work and 2.) been satisfied with the results.

The adoption makes sense. Legal departments face shrinking budgets and further demands for cost reductions from the C-suite as their units transform from the traditional model of unforeseen costs to controlled environments of expenditures. Plus, today’s typical legal department faces a marked increase in workloads as well as a growing need to quickly produce results for their clients.

Likewise, the resistance to adopting this trend that has been around for decades is also understandable as in-house lawyers question if their work will remain secure, if quality will suffer and if it is even worth the trouble. In fact, the top two reasons for avoiding LPO stemmed directly from quality concerns and value in terms of time vs. savings.

One forward-thinking organization quoted in the article stated that they improved LPO and by hiring a project manager who worked hand-in-hand with the LPO attorneys in India. This makes sense, as a majority of the “pain” surrounding LPO often relates directly back to the tools used to manage it – spreadsheets, documents and emails which limit visibility and impair results.

Imagine if you had technology to act as your project manager. Gone would be the endless emails, the outdated information on spreadsheets, calls from clients asking for updates and time-consuming searches for information and statuses.

Companies have done this – and greatly increased the results of their LPO initiatives – by adopting Smart Process Apps. Not only did they increase the efficiency of LPOs, but they also wrangled large savings with a small App. You don’t have to believe me. Take a look at the LPO eBook on legal process outsourcing and read about the success legal departments achieved.

Image provided by sheelamohan and freedigitalphotos.net