How Legal Ops teams can come to the strategic planning and road mapping table at their respective companies

1. Making the case for new technology in Legal Ops

2. Let’s take survey of the Legal Ops status quo:
Corporate Legal Departments are taking on more work internally
They are asked to be more than a “cost center”, but rather be a risk and cost avoidance
center of excellence
And yet
 Legal Departments still have considerable technology “debt” in the areas of spend management, contract
management, document management, workflow automation, collaboration platforms
 They remain “under-served” in terms of earmarked budgets allocated to technology investment and
transformation efforts
 Legal Departments are “under-represented” in the process of yearly technology roadmap planning and budget
allocation within the enterprise
 They often remain a “black box” to operational stakeholders and executives in terms of what they do, what
processes they serve and their potential impact to the corporate bottom line

3. So how do Legal Ops executives get a seat at the table?
By take a page from the playbook of other corporate functions in other industries that have been able to turn the
tables in the last 15 years (HR, customer service, cost accounting, inventory management, quality control, etc.).
Process and Technology Evangelism
 Rarely is there a formal “evangelist” job title in any corporate function
 You cannot simply be anointed” an “evangelist”. It’s not a personified effort.
 You probably won’t even notice or know that you are an “evangelist”
 If you spend a lot of time reading and going to webinars like this – chances
are, YOU are an “evangelist” 

4. Looking inward
Strategy
Planning
Metrics
Goals
Internal Strategy
How does the department need to support
long-term corporate growth (Products,
Markets, Legislative Landscapes)?
Planning
What shape does the Legal Department need
to take to support the corporate strategy?
What legal competencies will be key to the in-
house team?
Goals
What Service Levels are needed for internal
and external client satisfaction? Are we easy to
do business with?
Metrics
What do we need to measure beyond legal
spend? How to we quantify risk and cost
avoidance? What processes and systems do
we need to track the metrics that we defined?

5. Looking outward
Macro
Use
Cases
Platforms
vs point
solutions
Vendor
Feasibility
Total Cost
of
Ownership
Macro Use Cases
What broad Legal Ops functions are you
looking to transform/automate? What are your
peers at other companies doing?
Smaller targeted solutions vs broader use case
coverage?
Platforms vs point
solutions
Vendor Feasibility
Financial viability? Support Model? Security?
Industry experience?
Total Cost of Ownership
Think like a CIO & CFO:
- Long-term ROI
- Breadth of use case coverage
- Skills to implement & maintain
- Fit into existing technology footprint

6. Have a clear understanding of where you are in the maturity
cycle of key Legal Ops functions

7. Educate the rest of the enterprise on your strategy, goals and
needs: build a multi-year roadmap
Comprehensive view of Legal Ops processes and documented
inefficiencies
Identified technology gaps and areas where existing tools
and systems fall short
Functional capabilities needed to effectively support or
improve processes
Prioritized suggested timeline of projects and steps to be
undertaken

8. When at the annual corporate budget planning table:
Work with the CFO: have investment justifications that go beyond cost avoidance:
 Qualify internal and external stakeholder satisfaction
 Quantify legal project management efficiencies
 Qualify legal risk management efficiencies
Work with the CIO: outline the operational impact to IT
 Fit of solutions into current technology landscape
 Define needs for implementation
 Outline long-term skills and resource needed to maintain and support
Work with the COO/Other Execs: outline operational improvements to their departments:
 Service Levels for contracts, vendor reviews, other aspects of legal support
 Improved transparency and accountability during strategic business projects

9. FOR MORE INFORMATION
Contact: info@theunicornbusiness.com
www.ucbpros.com
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/the-
unicorn-business/