Legal Performance Measures

Every company, legal department and executive will be different in the story they want and need to tell. But whatever a department`s goals, data and performance metrics can be a powerful tool to convey that story and serve as a catalyst for change. Here are a few reasons why General Counsel is leading a measurement initiative: There is another KPI to consider, although it is a bit controversial. At least for me. This KPI would track what employees in the department spend their time, such as administrative tasks, emails, meetings, research, drive-bys, drafts, or anything else you want to measure in terms of workflow. The reason it`s controversial is that corporate lawyers generally hate anything related to tracking their time. Perhaps the main reason lawyers come into the business is to escape the time tracking of the lawyer`s life. When you start asking people to follow what they`re doing, you`ll hear about it. I know I did. And even though I thought the information would be extremely valuable in determining usage, effectiveness, the type of work sent to the legal department (and the difficulty of the same), and other key information, it just wasn`t worth it for my team to try to impose something like this on them.

Perhaps other advocates general have more courage than I do? That said, I`ve found ways to get insight into this topic through data from our case management and budgeting tools, my 1/1 meetings with my employees, and sometimes asking the entire team to estimate their high-level usage numbers. It`s not perfect, but it has allowed me to do it in part. So I`ll leave it to you to determine if this is a KPI you want to track. While KPIs are useful for law firms to measure your firm`s overall success and growth, you can also track the performance of individual team members, whether for yourself or for employees. These individual KPIs may include metrics such as: 8. Strategic project(s). Typically, there is at least one strategic project or initiative in a legal department in a given year. It could be a major technology implementation, a cost-cutting initiative, the creation of a succession plan or a “three-year” strategic plan, or whatever. No matter what it is, if it`s important enough, it`s worth tracking progress via a KPI. For example, I once had a KPI to track the implementation of a contract management tool that we were using to track completion progress against plan.

This KPI allowed us to quickly see if the project was on track or not, and if so, to ask why and what needed to be done to get it back on track. Reducing your legal department`s external expenses is often an important goal for just about any in-house lawyer, and it`s easy to track in a dashboard. You can go further and categorize expenses based on the risk and complexity of the project. Every aspect of a business requires KPIs, and the legal function is no exception. For scalable organizations that manage growing contract volumes, legal KPIs are essential for measuring the success of your legal department and identifying issues before they lead to risk. But what are legal KPIs, how can you define them, and how can you best track them in 2022? 1. Cost development: a KPI that helps legal departments control costs Measures used to measure the performance of paralegals` work may include the number of invoices approved and paid, taking minutes of board meetings, creating share certificates, investigating legal issues, preparing responses to subpoenas, and managing eDiscovery projects. Here are some “scenarios” to consider when identifying what data to collect and what key metrics to measure. However, before data collection is conducted, the objectives of introducing a data initiative or measuring against KPIs should be well documented and considered. The first step here might be to seek a conversation with the CEO or other organizational leaders who have an opinion on the performance that could be gathered. In addition to collaborating with stakeholders, consider the comments and comments of the entire legal team. While it`s mostly due to sales to keep up with these numbers, it`s always helpful for legal departments to know the level at which the legal department is engaged.

The use of measures to measure employee performance in the legal department can support the role of the General Counsel in: This is often the first reaction of a general counsel when the conversation about performance measures first takes place. Just as the issues and needs described above don`t just apply to large legal departments, the use of data to prove the value of a legal department, regardless of size, also doesn`t apply. This series provides practical tools and guidance that resonate with departments that are just beginning to measure key performance indicators, as well as demanding departments where legal operations experts focus solely on metrics. All right. Take a deep breath and calm down. Obviously, I`ve always been a bit passionate about this whole KPI/SMART goals thing. That said, I quickly realized that there were no options to complain about it or refuse to do so. At least if I wanted to stay in the chair of the Advocate General.

Also, I had to be honest with myself that KPIs bring real value, even if it was just to reassure senior management that I run the department like any other part of the business. And if we could understand it, I knew intuitively that KPIs could help support the narrative I wanted to tell about the legal department by digitally showing where the legal team was adding value to the business. Finally, it was clear that KPIs could show me where there are potential issues that need to be monitored or fixed. And that`s all valuable information, no matter how it happens. So I accepted the fact – like probably all in-house lawyers – that the KPIs of the legal department will remain here. So let`s talk about KPIs. In today`s business world, where analytics plays such an important role in performance management and strategic resource allocation, it`s not about “if” key performance indicators (KPIs) should be introduced, but “when”, “what”, “how” and “why”. By wisely linking KPIs to specific goals that the legal team wants to improve, and defining how KPIs drive improvements toward those goals, the legal team will not only track, but measure and improve in a targeted way.