Category: Enterprise Legal Management

Onit Acquires Bodhala, the Leading Provider of Legal Spend Analytics, Benchmarking, and Market Intelligence

Posted on September 1, 2021 by - Artificial Intelligence, Company News and Events, Enterprise Legal Management

At Onit, we always look for ways to innovate for our customers. An essential part of this priority has been strategically combining with other disruptive companies that are changing the way the world does business. To that end, Onit is proud to announce its fourth strategic acquisition since 2019: Bodhala, the leading provider of  legal spend analytics, benchmarking and market intelligence.

The combination of Onit’s and Bodhala’s capabilities creates the most complete enterprise legal management solution on the market, allowing corporate legal departments to evolve legal spend data into actionable intelligence.

Hear Onit CEO Eric M. Elfman and Bodhala CEO Raj Goyle discuss the acquisition and how actionable intelligence is the next wave of business transformation.

Actionable Intelligence for Legal Spend Management

A revolution of data and intelligence has been hitting every sector in recent years, and the legal industry is no exception. Running legal departments on actionable data is the future of digital transformation.

Bodhala helps corporate counsel understand what they should be paying outside counsel, making it easier to source law firms at competitive and market-driven rates. With its data and actionable intelligence, corporate legal departments can identify whether they should be paying the amounts they’re paying, whether they’re paying market price, if they’re properly allocating their work among their various law firms and more.

How does this translate to success? Here’s one example.

The general counsel of one of the largest private equity firms wanted to address annual rate increases from outside counsel. Their rates had been rising well above inflation every year. With Bodhala, the company conducted a competitive analysis of its law firms, compared rates to other firms in the market based on the type of law and complexity of work and gathered internal benchmarking across its panels.

After this analysis, the PE firm had the quantitative, actionable intelligence needed to negotiate a decrease in proposed annual outside counsel rates by 17% and save $27 million.

The Most Complete Enterprise Legal Management Solution on the Market

The combination of Onit and Bodhala creates the most complete, full-lifecycle enterprise legal management solution on the market.

Onit customers already have access to industry-leading enterprise legal management, AI-enabled invoice review and AI-based business intelligence and business process automation platforms. Now, with Bodhala, they can leverage legal spend analytics, benchmarking and market intelligence for a quantum leap in the value and savings they can produce for their businesses.

Bodhala will operate as an independent subsidiary of Onit. It is the third acquisition for Onit in less than a year. In November 2020, Onit acquired legal AI innovator McCarthyFinch and then document automation leader AXDRAFT 30 days later. Onit also acquired SimpleLegal, a modern legal operations software provider, in May 2019.

If you are an Onit or Bodhala customer, reach out to your account managers for more information or you can email Onit at [email protected].

To hear the CEOs of Onit and Bodhala discuss the acquisition, the strategy behind it and what it means for Onit and Bodhala customers, tune in to this podcast.

Trending Legal Operations Podcasts

Posted on August 9, 2021 by - Enterprise Legal Management

Podcasts have become the listening content of choice for many people worldwide, providing engaging audio on the way to work, during daily workouts or as part of a morning routine. Podcasts enable their listeners to gain new insights, expand their existing knowledge and keep track of trends in our fast-evolving world. Legal is no exception. Many exciting Legal Tech podcasts have emerged in recent years. However, finding the perfect series for you without listening to every episode can be tricky.

But don’t worry — we’ve got you covered! Our industry experts have compiled a list of leading legal operations podcasts to help you learn and stay up to speed on the latest legal tech, operations and innovation news and developments.

LEGAL TECH MADE SIMPLE, SYKE

Dom Burch, VP of marketing at SYKE, is neither a lawyer nor a tech expert, which makes him ideally qualified to make legal tech simple. Join him as he interviews expert legal engineers, software developers, and personnel in law firms and large corporations implementing legal tech. He aims to provide listeners with diverse views and opinions by speaking with thought leaders and innovators across the legal tech spectrum.
LISTEN NOW

LEGALTECH ARCADE, ROB MACADAM

Legaltech Arcade is a series of long-form interviews hosted by Rob MacAdam. The podcast focuses on tech-enabled legal service delivery and the people and products that make it happen through in-depth discussions with legal tech founders and senior industry leaders. Topics of discussion include legal platforms, no-code automation, digital transaction management, creating digitally driven law firms, professional services 2.0 and computational contracts. If you want to know more about what goes into setting up a legal tech start-up and gain insight into the latest industry developments, then be sure to check out this podcast.
LISTEN NOW

FRINGE LEGAL, ABHIJAT SARASWAT

Aimed at law firm leaders and influencers, each Fringe Legal episode is a thoughtful discussion with a diverse range of voices about ideas impacting the evolution of the legal profession. Along the way, listeners will learn about the challenges to overcome, what’s worked in the past, and expert tips on what could make a difference.
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LEGALTECH WEEK, BOB AMBROGI

LegalTech week presents a weekly round-up and review of legal technology and innovation news hosted by lawyer and journalist Bob Ambrogi, with commentary from a revolving panel of industry experts. It releases every Friday, all in 15 minutes or less.
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THE LEGAL OPS PODCAST, ALEX ROSENRAUCH AND ELLIOT LEIBU

The Legal Ops Podcast is about all things legal operations, legal business, and legal technology. The hosts are Alex Rosenrauch and Elliot Leibu, legal ops professionals with experience and passion for this subject and deep connections in the industry. Every episode covers a new aspect of transformation, operationalization, and technology implementation, overlaid with the human elements of change management and organizational psychology. If you’re interested in the changing nature of legal services delivery and want to be a part of it, this podcast is for you.
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FÜHRENDE LEGAL OPERATIONS PODCASTS IM JAHR 2023 

Posted on August 9, 2021 by - Enterprise Legal Management

Niemand kann sie ignorieren; sie haben sich als Lebensretter während des Lockdowns erwiesen. Ob auf dem Weg zur Arbeit, während des täglichen Workouts oder als Teil der Morgenroutine – Podcasts sind für viele Menschen auf der ganzen Welt zum bevorzugten Hörinhalt geworden. Viele Podcasts sind nicht nur unterhaltsam, sondern ermöglichen es ihren Hörern auch, neue Erkenntnisse zu gewinnen, ihr vorhandenes Wissen zu erweitern und die Trends in unserer sich schnell entwickelnden Welt zu verfolgen – und das gilt auch für den Bereich Recht. 

In den letzten Jahren sind viele spannende Legal-Tech-Podcasts entstanden. Wir wissen, dass es schwierig sein kann, die richtige Serie zu finden, ohne in jede einzelne Folge hineinzuhören. Deshalb hat unser Team von Branchenexperten eine Liste führender Podcasts zum Thema Legal Operations für Sie zusammengestellt. Diese Legal Operations Podcasts werden Ihnen dabei helfen, über die neuesten Nachrichten und Entwicklungen in den Bereichen Legal Tech, Legal Operations und Innovation informiert zu sein und auf dem Laufenden zu bleiben. 

In dem Podcast „EY Law – Legal Operations“ dreht sich alles um die Zukunft von Rechtsabteilungen in Unternehmen. Erfahren Sie, wie Rechtsabteilungen sich effektiver organisieren und sich in einer zunehmend dynamischen und digitalen Umgebung erfolgreich positionieren können. 

Carina Smolik-Fischer, Produktmanagerin unsere Matter Management-Lösung, war zu Gast im EY Law Podcast und berichtet von ihrer langjährigen Erfahrung im Legal-Tech-Markt. 

Legal Technology Panel mit Bryter, Busylamp und Luminance – Folge 1 

Eine spannende Folge über die Entwicklung und Zukunft von Legal Operations.  

Legal Technology Panel mit Bryter, Busylamp und Luminance – Folge 2 

Hier wird unter anderem beleuchtet, welchen Mehrwert Rechtsabteilungen zur Wertschöpfung eines Unternehmens beitragen können und wie Legal Tech bei der Messung von rechtlichen Leistungskennzahlen (Legal KPIs) unterstützend wirkt. 

Dom Burch, VP of Marketing bei SYKE, ist weder Anwalt noch Techniker. Daher ist er perfekt qualifiziert, um Legal Tech einfach zu machen. Begleiten Sie ihn bei seinen Interviews mit Experten aus der Welt der Rechtsingenieure und Softwareentwickler sowie mit Anwaltskanzleien und großen Unternehmen, die Legal Tech einsetzen. Sein Ziel ist es, den Zuhörern durch Gespräche mit Vordenkern und Innovatoren aus dem gesamten Legal-Tech-Bereich ein breites Spektrum an Ansichten und Meinungen zu vermitteln. 

JETZT ANHÖREN 

LEGALTECH ARCADE, ROB MACADAM  

Legaltech Arcade ist eine von Rob MacAdam moderierte Reihe von Interviews in Langform. Der Podcast konzentriert sich auf die technologiegestützte Erbringung von Rechtsdienstleistungen und die Menschen und Produkte, die dies alles ermöglichen. Rob führt ausführliche Gespräche mit Gründern von Legal Tech Unternehmen und führenden Vertretern der Branche. Zu den Diskussionsthemen gehören juristische Plattformen, No-Code-Automatisierung, digitales Transaktionsmanagement, die Schaffung digitaler Kanzleien, professionelle Dienstleistungen 2.0 und computergestützte Verträge. Wenn Sie mehr über die Gründung eines Legal-Tech-Start-ups erfahren und Einblicke in die neuesten Entwicklungen der Branche gewinnen möchten, dann sollten Sie sich diesen Podcast unbedingt anhören! 

JETZT ANHÖREN 

Jede Folge richtet sich an Führungskräfte von Anwaltskanzleien und an einflussreiche Persönlichkeiten und ist eine durchdachte Diskussion mit einer Vielzahl von Stimmen über Ideen, die sich auf die Entwicklung des Rechtsberufs auswirken. Dabei erfahren die Zuhörer, welche Herausforderungen es zu bewältigen gilt, was in der Vergangenheit funktioniert hat und welche Expertentipps in Zukunft den Unterschied ausmachen könnten. 

JETZT ANHÖREN 

LEGALTECH WEEK, BOB AMBROGI  

Ein wöchentlicher Überblick über Neuigkeiten im Bereich Rechtstechnologie und Innovation. Moderiert von Rechtsanwalt und Journalist Bob Ambrogi, mit Kommentaren einer wechselnden Gruppe von Branchenexperten. Jeden Freitag, in 15 Minuten oder weniger. 

JETZT ANHÖREN 

Der Legal Operations Podcast befasst sich mit allen Themen rund um rechtliche Abläufe, Rechtsgeschäfte und Rechtstechnologie. Moderiert wird er von Alex Rosenrauch und Elliot Leibu, Fachleuten aus dem Bereich Legal Operations mit Erfahrung und Leidenschaft für dieses Thema und guten Verbindungen in die Branche. Jede Folge behandelt einen neuen Aspekt der Transformation, Operationalisierung und Technologieimplementierung, überlagert mit den menschlichen Elementen des Change Managements und der Organisationspsychologie. Wenn Sie sich für den Wandel in der Bereitstellung von Rechtsdienstleistungen interessieren und daran teilhaben wollen, ist dies der richtige Podcast für Sie. 

JETZT ANHÖREN 

Ensure Accurate Legal Billing By Avoiding These Four Common Invoicing Problems

Posted on August 3, 2021 by - Business Process Management, Enterprise Legal Management

While having accurate legal billing is something all parties involved can agree on, it’s still a complicated process for large corporate legal departments. A single law firm bill may have hundreds of pages, clock in at millions of dollars and cover multiple matters, tasks and timekeepers. Outside counsel guidelines, billing code confusion and the sheer volume of bills further complicate invoice review.

As a result, charges can routinely fall in a gray area or violate outside counsel guidelines. They can slip past first-pass reviewers who are short on time and have multiple responsibilities. Even the most stringent automated billing rules may not flag some costs because of a wide variation in descriptions and billing tactics.

Take travel, for example. With lockdowns over the past year, accurate legal billing for travel-related costs should be a given. You logically expect that travel charges from law firms substantially decreased during that time. However, that wasn’t the case.

When Onit’s AI-enabled invoice review tool scoured historical invoices from a set of Fortune 500 customers, it discovered an average of six figures of savings in travel-related billed time and expenses submitted to customers. These are “gray area” charges that surpassed what had already been found by traditional billing rules and standard invoice review.

Common Invoice Errors That Make Accurate Legal Billing Challenging

Corporate legal departments want to know what services they’re paying for as part of their law firm partnerships. Otherwise, it’s difficult to make proper efficiency and cost control refinements.

We recently conducted an informal poll, asking corporate legal customers to name problems they encounter when reviewing invoices. Each of the following top-four improper e-billing and invoicing practices is a significant barrier to understanding and controlling legal spend.

  1. Vague or insufficient details in invoices

“For services rendered” or other vague descriptions are insufficient explanations of legal services. While each poor description may not seem like a pressing concern, the cumulative costs of this practice over several invoices reveal a much larger problem. Vague billing descriptions make understanding and controlling legal spend a nearly impossible task to undertake.

  1. Block billing

Block billing, or the practice of putting multiple work segments on multiple dates into one line item description, is raising red flags at corporate legal departments – especially when “going lean” is the name of the game. While it was a somewhat accepted standard for years, the dollars add up quickly and are difficult to catch. The practice also acts against conveying the value of law firm contributions since there is no transparency for the work they undertook.

How much of an impact can block billing have on spend? One legal operations leader reported a block billing charge of more than a million dollars – one that AI caught but only after it had made it past first reviewers.

  1. Improper coding of invoices

While it sounds like a simple task, you’d be surprised how often improper coding happens in a single day. Often the mistake is as simple as billers failing to select appropriate codes on dropdown menus. When work is attributed to the wrong billing code, it may trigger an additional review, taking extra time while also skewing legal spend analytics.

  1. Work being done by wrong staff class

How often have we done other people’s work and vice versa, whether above or below our pay grade? Not a real problem, right? Wrong. Sure, it happens, but it can add up quickly and work against accurate legal billing.

Certain types of work are better suited to a paralegal, legal assistant or intern than an attorney. Too often, though, those work efforts are being done by an attorney at a much higher rate. Or perhaps a task that would take a higher-billing partner five minutes to complete would take an associate much longer and so cost more. At the end of the day, corporate legal departments want the work performed by the appropriate level of staff.

Alleviating the Pain of Legal Invoice Review

Lean legal – doing more with less money and fewer resources while maintaining the same high quality – is the new paradigm at corporate legal departments. Technology plays a prominent role in achieving legal ops objectives with “less.” As hard as we try, law firm billing errors still happen, and corporate in-house legal teams will struggle to catch them. Well-chosen technologies – like AI and automated billing rules – bolster the opportunity for accurate legal billing.

If you’d like to read more about alleviating invoice review challenges, here are some resources:

The Onit Outlook Email Integration That Works Where Lawyers Work

Posted on June 24, 2021 by - Business Process Management, Contract Lifecycle Management, Enterprise Legal Management

Email remains one of the critical tools in-house lawyers use every day, making email integration with legal technology mandatory.

Too often, though, email programs exist outside of the systems that lawyers use to handle the rest of their day-to-day work. The disconnect forces them to navigate back and forth between different software programs like matter management or contract lifecycle management, undoing valuable efficiency gained during the day.

Simply put, while it’s essential, email can bog down productivity.

Onit Outlook Connect: The Email Integration that Enhances Efficiency

As part of Onit’s goal to work where lawyers work, we’ve recently made enhancements to Onit Outlook Connect. Our Microsoft Outlook plug-in allows you to connect your email with all of your favorite products and solutions on Onit’s business process automation and artificial intelligence platforms.

Onit’s email integration allows you to file your emails directly into other systems, such as specific matters in your enterprise legal management software or contracts in your contract lifecycle management software. You get direct access to Onit from within Microsoft Outlook without having to navigate to different windows or launch new tools.

The plug-in appears in a panel on the right-hand side of your Outlook window. It gives you a quick view into your matters and most recent or favorite records, so you can easily see a snapshot of the essential information you need. From there, you can link directly into the record you need and do your work in Onit, all without having to jump to another panel or browser or re-authenticate your credentials.

The Onit email integration is the shortcut you need to handle your email and work in the same place

Simply choose the apps or tools you want to link to Outlook, and you’ll start seeing synopses of your work alongside your email every time you access it going forward. Get in, get out and focus on the work that matters most. Not only do you get to work where you’re already working, but you can keep everything organized in one place. Email linking and better organization mean better efficiency. Your email no longer has to be a hindrance to productivity.

At Onit, we’re always looking to create solutions that help lawyers do their best, most efficient work. Our ELM, CLM and other solutions are constantly innovated to provide process efficiency and work where our customers work.

Email is no different.

Reach out to your account manager today to learn more about how Onit Outlook Connect can change the way you use email in your day-to-day work. You can also schedule a demonstration or email [email protected].

How to Balance Legal Cost Management with Rising Associate Fees

Posted on June 17, 2021 by - Business Process Management, Enterprise Legal Management

Legal cost management has become more challenging for corporate legal departments, as law firms’ associate salaries continue to climb.

Despite the global pandemic, many law firms had surprisingly strong financial performances in 2020. Reports show AmLaw 50 law firms saw a revenue increase of more than 7%, with other firms reporting double-digit growth and profits per partner jumping 30%.

Now, the nation’s top law firms have raised associate salaries in the hopes of remaining competitive and retaining top legal talent. First-year associate salaries at top firms now sit at $200,000, increasing as associates go up in seniority.

While this is certainly good news for associates, many corporate legal departments are conflicted since the bump will surely be reflected in law firm fees. Some corporate legal leaders view the salary increase with skepticism, especially when companies are under heavy pressure to cut costs and control legal spend. As more and more firms continue to match the new associate pay scales, in-house counsel and legal operations will have to find new ways to respond to the rising fees.

Six Strategies for Legal Spend Containment

While higher associate rates might lead to more pressure, the challenge isn’t insurmountable when it comes to legal cost management. The following are just a few strategies that corporate legal departments can employ to better understand and potentially offset those increased charges on their end.

  1. Set automated billing rules that address time charged to junior associates. Many corporations disallow billing by first-year associates during their ramp-up period and may start more closely scrutinizing overall firm staffing on matters now that rates are increasing. Any such rules should be clearly included in outside counsel guidelines.
  2. Closely review all your bills. No one enjoys legal invoice review, but it’s critical for catching improper costs. While not necessarily intentional, inconsistent coding and charges from improper billers happen all the time. They’re often missed because they’re buried in long bills with extensive charges.
  3. Pursue alternative fee arrangements. Whether it’s flat fee billing or contingency arrangements, alternatives to the billable hour model are increasing in popularity among corporate clients. Outside counsel might collaborate with you to implement them.
  4. Consider shifting some work in-house or to alternative legal service providers (ALSPs). As outside representation becomes more expensive, now is the time to take a detailed look at whether all the work you’re outsourcing to law firms could be handled just as well by internal resources or more cost-effective ALSPs.
  5. Move work from associates to paralegals or administrative personnel where possible. Junior lawyers often handle tasks that don’t require someone of their skillset. As associate rates go up, it’s more important than ever to ensure that every task is being handled at the right staffing level.
  6. Understand your overall approach to legal cost management to see where your dollars are going. Are you paying for things like overhead charges and photocopies or are you allowing invoices that include block billing? Eliminating these charges can help offset the newly increased associate fees.

The Role of Enterprise Legal Management and AI Invoice Review

All of the above cost-cutting measures will be significantly easier and more effective if you have the right enterprise legal management software (ELM) and AI-powered invoice review tools. These tools incorporate electronic billing, automated billing rules, machine learning and more which make it easier to enforce your outside counsel guidelines and engage in legal spend management.

AI is far more efficient at reviewing lengthy legal invoices and better at catching improper coding – charges that aren’t allowed, work that’s being handled at the wrong level and more. In-house legal professionals are already tasked with doing more with fewer resources and manual invoice review shouldn’t add to that burden.

Whether you turn to third-party review or implement your own internal solutions, you stand to better understand your overall spend and significantly reduce costs. InvoiceAI, Onit’s new AI offering for legal invoice review, has already identified six-figure savings in improperly billed travel costs for Onit customers during a time when travel was at an all-time low. The potential savings from using the right tools is significant.

ELM enables the e-billing, legal spend management and matter management you need to get insight into and control over your legal spend. Schedule a demo today or email [email protected] to learn more.

The Evolution of Matter Management

Posted on June 11, 2021 by - Enterprise Legal Management

A recent webinar hosted by ECLA and Onit’s European legal spend management solution BusyLamp eBilling.Space charted the development of matter management from document repository to connected workspace – looking at current solutions, the impact of COVID-19, and future trends.

The webinar, part of the ECLA Learning Centre series, brought together Rob McAdam, VP of product at BusyLamp (an Onit Company), Sven Preiss, head of legal commercial at Scout24, and Xavier Langlois, general counsel at Beamery.

The webinar started by considering the meaning of matter management and what it entails for a corporate legal team. It was agreed that matter management is fast evolving beyond a system of record to one of collaboration and engagement, with increased use of automation and self-service tools built in. Indeed, given the pandemic, ways of working have changed dramatically. From asynchronous working to increased knowledge sharing – seismic changes in our ways of operating are all relevant to future matter management systems. “The most important area for me now is collaboration,” said Sven Preiss. “Not everyone is there all of the time. To give consistent, quality legal advice, it’s important to have somewhere to search.”

Today’s often remote and more flexible working patterns also increase the need for matter management systems that can be integrated with tools such as Slack and Teams that so many of us use. “The need to capture detailed notes and status reports about where things stand will become more important,” pointed out Rob MacAdam. “And with even conservative law firms moving to things like DocuSign, this is clearly a time for change,” added Xavier Langlois. Indeed, for Beamery’s legal team, it’s also accelerated the implementation of a new matter management tool. “This was a perfect opportunity to start with a clean slate,” he explained, adding: “The legal team has to be able to speak the same language as the business.”

The panel also agreed that – in many ways – technology had brought disparate groups together, bringing positive behavioral changes that look set to make legal teams more efficient and more accountable. Looking ahead to six key trends in the coming months and years, the below points were identified as critical components of an effective matter management system:

1. Data and Intelligent Insight

With legal functions turning to data to track performance and status and to monitor risk, matter management systems are helpful as they aggregate data gathered through workflows. This leads to insights, with the system having the potential to act as an early alert system or a predictive tool. Yet teams must learn how to analyze this data effectively. “This is a great opportunity to align to company objectives through data,” said Xavier. “Predictive and machine learning has to be the next level of matter management. It can free up legal teams to do other things.”

But the panel also agreed on the need for training and guidance in terms of the usage of AI and for systems to have parameters built in. “Don’t overpromise the benefits of using certain tools,” warned Rob. “Technology can offer so much value, but you get out what you put in. You must invest in time, too.” Fortunately, with younger generations, in particular, keen to leverage data and technology, it was agreed that the will, and the energy, are often there.

2. Interoperability

With so many of us comfortable working in systems such as Zoom, Teams, and Slack, interoperability is increasingly important regarding matter management. It’s important that users don’t feel forced to leave the tools they like working with to engage with legal teams while the use of plug-ins and APIs looks set to rise. “People want to work within their preferred tools. We picked the one which integrated most easily,” pointed out Xavier.

3. Knowledge Delivery

Knowledge delivery also looks set to be one of the biggest trends over the next couple of years. For instance, MacAdam pointed to the potential for matter management systems to deliver relevant, up-to-date information in the context in which it is needed. “What would be perfect would be a really good search engine for your knowledge database, being able to deliver knowledge in a structured way and at your fingertips,” added Sven. “There are lots of questions that come up all the time and which could be categorized and answered by a chatbot,” he said, pointing out that AI could play an important role there.

4. Process Automation

With in-house teams frequently getting bogged down in lower value, manual, routine tasks, process automation can dramatically improve productivity. This has led to an increased focus on process automation – for instance, to support contract approval. A key piece of advice in this regard was to look first at high volume, low touchpoint engagements such as NDAs – “which should not require six email exchanges” – and then to build on that.

5. Self-Service

Self-serve systems can be a way of demonstrating value to clients – helping them to get their jobs done more quickly, too. And, with more and more matter management systems incorporating such tools, it’s easy to deliver quick wins. For instance, many new contract management tools now have native e-signature functionality.

6. External Collaboration

As matter management systems become engagement and collaboration tools, they look set to enable diverse teams to work on tasks together, tracking status and improving efficiency. Yet, to make technology-driven matter management a success, Rob’s advice – before deployment – was to start small but aim high; to prioritize problems to solve; to look at current processes while talking to IT and procurement, and to build a business case that includes a vision for the value a system will bring, and which is subsequently monitored. It’s also important to ensure adequate training and support are in place while responding to feedback. If something is not working, simply change and adapt.

Find out more by watching the full webinar on demand here.

Thank you to The European Company Lawyers Association (ECLA) for inviting BusyLamp to run this matter management session. 

Request a demo of BusyLamp eBilling.space.

Five Legal Operations Trends Uncovered in the CLOC 2021 State of the Industry Report

Posted on June 10, 2021 by - Business Process Management, Enterprise Legal Management

What are the latest legal operations trends affecting corporate legal? According to the Corporate Legal Operations Consortium’s (CLOC) 2021 State of the Industry Survey report, the median external spend increased by 84%, more work has moved in-house and legal departments continue to grow.

In collaboration with the Association of Corporate Counsel, the survey solicited responses from 200 organizations, 48 of which were Fortune 500 companies, across more than 22 industries in 31 states and 21 countries. Respondents spanned a wide range of industries, with the most (26%) coming from the technology sector.

1. External Legal Spend Up by 84%, But Internal Legal Spend Catches Up

While outside legal spend varied widely across survey participants, the overall results showed a marked increase in external legal expenditure in 2020 as compared to 2019. Median outside spend nearly doubled in the past year, up to $14.5 million from $7.9 million the previous year. (For those looking to control legal costs, here’s a good place to start.)

The median internal legal spend wasn’t far off, coming in at $13.3 million. While there was some variation based on the size of the companies, overall legal spend across all survey participants broke down exactly 50-50 between internal and external legal expenditure. In the previous year, the split came in at 60-40 in favor of external spend.

2. In-House Counsel, ALSPs Taking on More Work

Despite increased external spend, companies are bringing more work in-house – something indicated by past legal operations trends founded by CLOC. In fact, 39% of respondents reported moving more work in-house in 2020, compared to 28% the year before.

The prominence of alternative legal service providers (ALSPs) continued to slowly increase over the past year, highlighting other significant legal operations trends. For example, when it came to ALSPs, 71% of respondents reported using the same number of ALSPs as in the previous year. However, 24% increased the number of ALSPs they used and 21% reported shifting more work to ALSPs as opposed to law firms. Three-quarters of the participants said that the law firm/ALSP balance remained the same as in the previous year.

3. Legal Operations Trends Point to Larger Legal Departments

Among the companies surveyed, the average size of the legal department was 104 full-time employees, with smaller companies reporting fewer legal department employees and larger companies reporting larger legal departments. The entertainment/media, insurance and biotech/pharma/life sciences sectors reported having the most full-time employees in their legal departments.

Increases in legal department headcount mirrored those of last year – 40% of respondents in 2021 said they increased their number of dedicated legal operations full-time employees, just as they did in 2020. The most notable increases in headcount were seen at mid-sized companies. The average size of legal operations teams also increased across both industry sectors and company sizes.

4. Clarity Around Legal Operations Responsibilities – Proof of Function’s Maturity

Not surprisingly, the top-five most common services provided by legal operations were the same in 2021 as they were in 2020, according to survey participants. This signals the growing influence and prevalence of legal operations on the whole – meaning there’s a consensus in the industry on the role and value of the responsibility.

The most common legal operations services include:

  • Process development and project management
  • Data analytics
  • Technical and process support
  • Vendor management
  • Financial management

5. Priorities for 2021 and Beyond

According to the legal operations trends uncovered by CLOC, in-house legal departments are also looking ahead to shifting priorities. Implementing a Diversity and Inclusion program was ranked as the top priority in 2021 for 61% of respondents, up from a fifth-place ranking the previous year. Other priorities included automating legal processes (as exemplified by this contract lifecycle management case study), implementing new technology and right sourcing legal work.

You can read the entire survey report here.

Get the inside track on legal operations trends, the very best events and helpful content from the legal community by joining Lean Into LegalOps today.

Legal Industry News: Current News and Trends in Legal Department Operations, June 2021

Posted on June 8, 2021 by - Artificial Intelligence, Business Process Management, Enterprise Legal Management

Welcome to Onit’s June industry run-down, where we share with you some of the most pertinent and timely articles on legal department operations news. We hope this roundup of legal industry trends provides some useful takeaways.

In today’s digest, we share a recap of CLOC’s annual State of the Industry Survey and its recent virtual Global Institute, words of advice for corporate legal transformation, how AI finds even more billing guidelines violations and more.

#1 AI in the Legal Sector by the Numbers

More and more corporate legal departments are turning to AI every day to handle manual tasks, boost efficiency and gain insights for informed decision-making. You’ve likely already incorporated AI into some aspect of your day-to-day practice. After all, we’ve all heard the claims about how much it transforms everyday tasks. But just how much of a difference does AI really make?

This blog post breaks down the numbers and outlines some of the most significant gains to be gained through AI in the legal sector, including:

  • A 24% reduction in the average sales cycle and a 9% annual cost reduction by using an AI-powered CLM solution
  • A 51.5% increase in user productivity and the ability to redline a contract in under 2 minutes with legal AI software for contract review
  • The ability to review 6,000 contracts at once and access over 500 contract data points with AI for contract extraction
  • A 5-10% reduction in outside counsel spend with an AI-powered ELM solution

(Source: Onit blog)

#2 CLOC Sets Benchmarks for Legal Department Operations

The Corporate Legal Operations Consortium (CLOC) recently released the 2021 State of the Industry Survey report, the organization’s annual review of trends to watch in the legal ops space. This year’s survey, conducted in collaboration with the Association of Corporate Counsel, garnered responses from 200 organizations (including 48 Fortune 500 companies) across more than 22 industries in 31 states and 21 countries.

The 2021 report highlights how priorities have shifted through the uncertainty of 2020, with legal ops growing, legal spend increasing and more work coming in-house. Some of the most notable survey results include:

  • 39% of respondents said they brought more work in-house in 2021, compared to only 28% the year before
  • Nearly all respondents reported using the same number or more ALSPs than the year before
  • 40% of respondents increased their number of dedicated, full-time legal ops employees
  • 61% of respondents identified implementing a Diversity and Inclusion program as a top priority for 2021

You can read the entire survey report here.

(Source: CLOC)

#3 Workflow Automation, Return to Office Top “Big Picture” Plans for Legal Department Operations

On the final day of CLOC’s recent virtual Global Institute, one legal department operations panel took an in-depth look at why organizations need a well-defined plan for implementing new technology and preparing to handle business in a post-pandemic world.

Legal ops professionals will play a huge role in that planning and implementation. They’re pivotal in big-picture technology adoption because they’re often the most on top of innovation and the latest trends in the legal tech market. Legal ops will also be integral to making sure the rest of the legal department and the business as a whole actually adopt the new technologies they find.

(Source: Legaltech News)

#4 Legal Department Operations Leaders Share Their Best Strategies for Transformation

Change is a constant in our world, especially in the last year and a half. While workloads continue to increase in-house, the need to work quickly and effectively remains a common goal. But how can legal operations professionals spur change – especially technological change  – in corporate legal?

Corporate legal department operations experts from Mastercard, McKesson, Microsoft and GlaxoSmithKline sat down at the CLOC Global Institute to explain their best approaches, including:

  • Understanding the reasons for resistance
  • Communicating the vision of change and what that means
  • Conveying the importance of transformation on a personal level to team members
  • Understanding what resources are necessary to enact change, including people, tools and priorities

Bonus: What’s driving transformation in legal? Operations expert Brad Rogers digs into the topic, breaks down what is accelerating the need for change in corporate legal. Scroll to the bottom of this blog post to hear the podcast. You can also find the Onit podcast on Apple, Google Play, Spotify or other podcast platforms.

(Source: Corporate Counsel)

#5 How to Find Up to 11% More Non-Compliant Charges in Legal Invoices After Billing Rules and Standard Review

Growing workloads and other priorities limit the time in-house counsel can devote to reviewing outside counsel bills spanning hundreds of pages and thousands of line items. Enterprise legal management, matter management, e-billing, billing code standards and automated billing rules reduce the burden of invoice review. However, AI offers the opportunity for even more technological innovation.

On May 26, Onit announced the debut of InvoiceAI, an AI offering for first-pass legal invoice review and analytics that’s now available to customers. InvoiceAI handles first-pass legal invoice review to identify errors better and increase the consistency of application of billing guidelines and spend management best practices.

On average, InvoiceAI has identified 6-11% of unactioned errors in historical invoices, above and beyond what had already been identified by standard invoice review. Even in a year when travel was significantly restricted, InvoiceAI uncovered an average of $100,000 worth of savings on travel-related time and expenses that had been improperly submitted to customers.

For a free AI analysis of 90 days of historical billing data, Onit customers can reach out to their account managers and other interested parties can email [email protected].

(Source: LawSites Blog)

Get the inside track on legal department operations trends, the very best events and helpful content from the legal community by joining Lean Into LegalOps today. The program unites the legal community, providing them with a forum to share and learn from one another and get the latest news and trends in legal operations and technology.

Meet InvoiceAI: Onit’s New Artificial Intelligence Offering for Legal Invoice Review

Posted on May 26, 2021 by - Artificial Intelligence, Business Process Management, Enterprise Legal Management

Legal invoice review is a necessary process for corporate legal departments and also notoriously complex and time-consuming – even with business rules applied. Nevertheless, legal departments spend countless dollars every year for in-house counsel and other professionals to manually inspect invoices, whether flagged or not. That’s time wasted on administrative tasks that in-house professionals can reallocate to higher-value work and strategies.

That’s all about to change.

Today, Onit announced the debut of InvoiceAI for its customers. The artificial intelligence offering for first-pass legal invoice review and analytics decreases the burden of invoice review while providing insights into spend analytics.

An Intelligent Review

The sheer volume of legal invoices has pummeled Fortune 500 corporate legal departments for years, challenging corporate counsels’ ability to understand and control legal spend and build productive partnerships with law firms.

Even with flagged invoices, corporate counsel can face a large number of line items on each invoice to reconcile and miss noted issues or errors. Enforcing outside counsel guidelines is complicated even further with issues like vague or incomplete invoices, improper block billing, incorrect coding and more.

InvoiceAI builds off Onit’s existing billing rules engine, enhancing the invoice review process by incorporating machine learning and natural language processing to more accurately and efficiently identify invoice issues that need further review. Our machine learning models identify potentially problematic billing issues like administrative tasks or travel and integrate with existing eBilling, legal spend management and enterprise legal management technologies. What you get is an intelligent review that learns more as you process more invoices, plus all the advantages of our configurable rules engine – the best of both worlds when it comes to understanding legal spend.

AI-Powered Invoice Review Leads to Significant Cost Savings

While InvoiceAI’s models continue their training, the offering is already used to analyze past invoices and identify potentially non-compliant charges under company billing guidelines and legal spend management best practices.

A select group of Onit Fortune 100 customers ran InvoiceAI through historical bills with significant results. InvoiceAI uncovered on average of 6-11% unactioned errors for invoices submitted in 2020, above and beyond the savings that Onit’s rules-based invoice review tools had already found.

For example, even though 2020 was a notably slow year for travel, InvoiceAI identified travel charges in the high six-figure range that should not have been billed.

On top of better invoice review, you also get powerful analytics. The results generated by InvoiceAI can serve as a learning tool for outside counsel, giving them a clear report on the core commercial expectations of the companies they represent. The reports are also beneficial for demonstrating immediate savings in outside spend to internal stakeholders.

The Future of Legal Invoice Review, Ready Now for Customers

InvoiceAI is available to Onit customers now and will be generally available to the public in the fall.

AI-enabled invoice review from SimpleLegal, Onit’s subsidiary, will launch this summer, with availability open now for select existing corporate legal customers.

If you’re currently an Onit or SimpleLegal customer and you want a complimentary AI analysis of the last 90 days of your billings, contact your account manager today.

If you’re not currently a customer but want to learn more about how InvoiceAI can improve your legal invoice review and legal spend management, contact [email protected] today.