CLOC LIO Project Recognizes Law Firms That Have Achieved Innovation in Legal Operations

SAN JOSE, Calif., May 28, 2020 /PRNewswire/ -- The Corporate Legal Operations Consortium (CLOC) is thrilled to recognize three recipients of the inaugural Legal Innovation in Operations Project ("The LIO Project''). This prestigious recognition program was designed to honor those law firms seeking to achieve innovation and design excellence in legal operations, thereby contributing to the continuing evolution of the global corporate legal ecosystem.

The LIO Project is focused on how law firms are changing their practice group service and business models to better address client needs from an operational (rather than substantive) perspective. It is about analyzing, designing and improving the client experience and business performance of a company through the lens of its corporate legal function and their internal business customers. And, it is about demonstrating the role and value the legal function can play when it focuses on business outcomes rather than solely legal outcomes.

The LIO Project's purpose is to honor those law firms that are developing innovation and design excellence through interaction with in-house legal operations teams.  To assess the law firm entries, CLOC utilized a scorecard to stack rank those entries based on several criteria, including:

• Applicability of the solution to meet client needs and addresses a specific articulated issue or pain point.
• Relevance of the problem across a relatively large market of users/clients.
• How thoroughly the solution was stress tested.
• Feasibility that the solution can be easily built, replicated or acquired by others.
• Whether the solution was delivered within one of the CLOC CORE 12 functional areas.
• Inclusiveness of the solution in addressing the needs of both business of law personnel and legal practitioners.
• Identification and application of specific metrics and measurements.
• Team and individual development of new learnings and insights gained from their efforts.

We were extremely pleased to receive a number of exciting law firm submissions and appreciate each of the firms that made the effort to participate in our inaugural LIO Project. Your enthusiasm and creativity is inspiring and we look forward to your continued engagement with the CLOC community. Without further ado, we are excited to announce the three law firms who are being recognized as "2020 LIO Leaders" within the CLOC community.

Husch Blackwell: In becoming the National Coordinating Counsel charged with leading a large asbestos litigation portfolio the firm was asked by its client to craft an entirely new and creative approach. This team developed a unique service model including new compensation and incentives for the firm lawyers which fed partly into a unique AFA structure. Beyond this, the actual client experience was explored, contemplated, and stress-tested early on to ensure that the firm was meeting not just the client's business objectives but was also accounting for their human strengths and weaknesses – needs and key jobs. In the first 10 months, this model reduced active docketed matters by 30% and lowered legal spend by over 30% all while balancing the business objectives of and aligning firm incentives with the client and maintaining high quality work.

Kelley Drye: In reimagining how to reconcile and manage bankruptcy claims for one of its clients, a team at this firm created and launched a tailor made digital interface. The primary focus was to allow their client to "reclaim" significant amounts of time while also improving the accessibility and accuracy of key information. While this solution relies heavily on technology, the team employed various methods and approaches from design thinking in order to capture the real user problem and ultimate user experience of the tool and process.

KO Law Firm: Designed an entirely new legal business model within the contracts management arena that is proving highly beneficial to clients with limited in-house and/or contract management capabilities. By applying a new and creative lens to the traditional people, process, and technology triad, this team experimented to find the appropriate business model through which it could generate value for its clients and itself. In doing so, they didn't just focus on how legal services are delivered; they also engineered a unique operating model that ensures scale and sustainability for this new model.

Congratulations to the CLOC LIO Project recipients! And, thank you to all the Law Firms who submitted their entries for this year's LIO Project and to all the law firms who are bringing innovation and excellence to their legal operations counterparts. Look for a video showing the solutions on cloc.org soon.

About Corporate Legal Operations Consortium (CLOC)
The Corporate Legal Operations Consortium is a global community of experts focused on redefining the business of law. By helping legal operations professionals collaborate with each other and with other industry players, including law firms, technology providers, and law schools, CLOC seeks to improve the delivery of legal services. CLOC is a 501(c)6 non-profit professional association.

SOURCE CLOC

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