Dana is a legal operations professional with nearly 20 years of experience in corporate legal and legal operations. She is passionate about improving business processes and creating efficiencies while building camaraderie within legal departments. She worked for 17 years in Silicon Valley, at NetApp (14 years) and FireEye (3 years). Before moving to Silicon Valley, she worked for Orange County Public Defender in Southern California. Her Juris Doctor (JD) is from Western State University College of Law and she holds a Bachelor of Science degree from California Polytechnic State University, San Luis Obispo. If you are interested in becoming a legal operations specialist, there are many roles for litigation-focused lawyers or people with non-legal backgrounds. The job board organized by Juro is a great place to access here. IP management was one of the core competencies previously identified by CLOC as an integral part of legal operations. It involved hiring a team or individual to manage the most important aspects of intellectual property (IP) within a company, whether collecting important data or protecting intellectual property, without the need for external advice.
The other critical factor in the success of the legal department is building relationships – within the legal department and across the company. Connie says it`s essential for an LDO professional to build strong relationships with general counsel staff and cross-functional colleagues inside and outside the legal department. In addition, it is also important to realize and implement a quick profit from the beginning in order to build trust. Just as relationships within your organizational department are valuable, Connie advises that it`s also important to network outside the company to share best practices across different departments and industries. This is CLOC`s top priority. If you don`t know how to hire for legal operations jobs, don`t worry. Below are some examples of job descriptions to help you understand the type of candidates to recruit and what to look for in their work. Legal operations is the management activity of a law firm. Chapter 2 | What makes a savvy buyer? Denise Nurse, CEO and Founder, Halebury Learn how to become a savvy buyer of legal services: Best practice tips for finding, appointing, monitoring and managing outside lawyers.
More and more legal departments are leveraging the Legal Department Operations Manager (LDO) Manager, according to Thomson Reuters` 2016 Legal Department In-Sourcing and Efficiency report. This position is quickly becoming an invaluable role for large and medium-sized departments, and the skills and ideals of this role are essential for all sizes of legal departments. According to the Efficiency Report, LDO experts represent a significant opportunity for departments to increase effectiveness and allow in-house lawyers to spend more time on actual legal practice. In most cases, it`s all about deciding how to become a more savvy buyer of legal services, from setting better supplier goals to knowing how and where to find the best suppliers in the first place. Successful legal operations managers often have a strong background in supplier management and change management initiatives. In-depth knowledge of technology solutions, including contract management, knowledge management and case management, helps the legal operations manager leverage the inherent value of business data and make recommendations for procurement and service delivery strategies. Legal operations means managing the in-house legal department like a business and focusing on skills such as financial management, analysis and service design to make the legal situation efficient, effective and fit for the modern business. Legal operations managers dive deep into the firm`s budget.
They break down where the money goes within the company and where the money comes from. They also provide stable financial planning for the future. James Sullivan, Head of Legal Affairs and Corporate Secretary, Monzo | Integrate an operational mindset: Despite the fact that a member of the legal team has always taken on certain tasks, such as selecting law firms to collaborate and manage billing, it has taken a long time for these tasks to be seen as part of the larger strategy we now call Legal Ops. Another advantage of IP management competence is that it allows the rest of the organization to better understand how intellectual property can be protected, rather than knowledge reserved for internal litigation. As an operations manager for an internal department, Dana adds that you need to take the time to inform the entire company about your role, responsibilities and contributions. Dana advises, „Many of your colleagues may have very little knowledge or understanding of the function of legal operations. Whether your legal department has a newly created legal department or legal transactions are just one of the many „hats” you wear, you need to become a „legal operations evangelist” within your legal department as well as cross-functional. „It can be as simple as conducting a survey or interviews to take the pulse of the company, or offering to present at team meetings to explain the role and how it relates across the organization.