Applying Continuous Improvement to high-end legal services

Transcription

1 Applyig Cotiuous Improvemet to high-ed legal services

2 Cotiuous Improvemet is a structured ad logical approach to aalysig ad improvig how people work. It is ot ew: i fact, it ca trace its history back over 100 years to the maufacturig iovatios that heralded mass productio, but adoptio i the legal idustry is still rare. is at the forefrot of the deploymet of Cotiuous Improvemet techiques i the legal sector. This paper sets out our experieces over the past five years of applyig this methodology withi a elite law firm; the beefits experieced by our cliets ad by the firm; ad our views o how Cotiuous Improvemet will be used by lawyers i the future. If you ca t describe what you are doig as a process, you do t kow what you are doig. W. Edwards Demig

3 cotets Cotiuous Improvemet i the legal sector Uderstadig law as a process Startig with recogisable processes Idetifyig broader opportuities for improvemet... 6 Makig chage happe Workig with cliets Evaluatig results Buildig a efficiecy culture The future About Differet ways of workig at

4 4 Applyig Cotiuous Improvemet to high-ed legal services Applyig Cotiuous Improvemet to high-ed legal services Cotiuous Improvemet is a combiatio of the well-established process improvemet methodologies of lea (which is about doig the right thigs) ad six sigma (which is about doig those thigs right). Cotiuous Improvemet is more tha just process mappig; it is a collaborative approach where a expert i the tools ad techiques of Cotiuous Improvemet helps a group of people familiar with the relevat task to aalyse what they are doig ad to fid ways of doig it better. Put simply, it ivolves applyig scietific rigour to determie the best approach to carryig out a piece of work. The startig poit for ay Cotiuous Improvemet project is the voice of the cliet : establishig what the cliet wats, what they value ad makig sure that is precisely what is delivered every time. Cotiuous Improvemet i the legal sector Despite the fact that process improvemet priciples are ow used i may differet walks of life, it is rare to hear lawyers discussig a value stream map or seekig out the iput of a black belt, the experts i this craft. However, the legal sector is ow udergoig a umber of importat developmets that are likely to chage this. The icreased emphasis o value is most certaily a driver. May orgaisatios are seekig to cotrol carefully their legal sped. They are lookig to their law firms for discouts or other fee arragemets to help reduce costs. Efficiecy improvemets ca ofte have the same effect. Case study Makig documet review flow Durig the course of litigatio, or i respose to regulatory equiries, our cliets are required to collect large quatities of data that ca amout to may hudreds of thousads of s ad documets. The documets must the be reviewed to idetify those documets that are resposive to the particular litigatio or regulatory request. We worked with a team of parters, lawyers ad case maagers i Lodo to aalyse this process ad foud that, by makig a few chages, we were able to improve its efficiecy sigificatly. For example, by istitutig formal commuicatio poits withi the process, we were able to icrease the flow of documets through the review team which comprised both paralegals ad juior lawyers by givig them more efficiet access to the experieced lawyers workig o the matter. Queries from the review team were dealt with o a daily basis, therefore reducig the umber of documets tagged icorrectly. Feedback is immediate, givig the reviewers a clearer uderstadig of the documets ad related issues. The itroductio of a statistical sample size calculator also eabled the team to decide, o a mathematical basis, the optimum umber of documets to be checked for quality assurace purposes. Usig these techiques o suitable documet reviews ca potetially lead to sigificat time savigs o the previous process overall by decreasig the umber of documets that are tagged icorrectly ad reducig the amout of seior lawyer time spet reviewig irrelevat documets. We have also itroduced a stadard template briefig documet ad review protocol. This has esured that teams are better prepared before the review ad the lawyers are egaged from the outset with the review team ad the issues., Jauary 2014

5 Applyig Cotiuous Improvemet to high-ed legal services 5 Case study Makig boud volumes easier, cheaper ad faster Makig a boud volume, the idexed compilatio of trasactio documets prepared for referece at the ed of a matter, used to be a time-cosumig ad paper-heavy process that caused a lot of frustratio. Give that over 1,500 boud volumes are produced each year i s Lodo office aloe, this was fertile territory for oe of the firm s first Cotiuous Improvemet projects. A team of people ivolved i the process from parter to prit room was brought together to idetify iefficiecies ad areas for improvemet. The origial process teded to be iitiated late i the timetable of the trasactio ad ivolved a great deal of duplicatio ad uecessary pritig. The revised process ow begis at a much earlier stage ad draws more heavily o techology to avoid wasted effort ad paper. The ew process has reduced the cost of producig a boud volume by approximately 60% ad has reduced the time take to dispatch a boud volume followig the ed of a trasactio by up to 80%. Equally importat to cliets is fidig a better, more sustaiable way of doig thigs. Simpler, more maageable, trasparet, predictable ad, ideed, faster delivery of projects ad trasactios brigs huge beefits to i-house legal teams pressurised by their ow costraied resource ad ever-broadeig resposibilities. Aother critical shift is that legal advice is ow see as a more itegral elemet of the commercial picture. The scope of the legal advice required is adjusted to match the risk of the matter, meaig that it is o loger a fixed or absolute cocept; the legal dimesio has become aother cosideratio i the matrix that will decide whether a trasactio, or particular course of actio, is attractive or feasible. As a result, lawyers have become part of the process ad legal fees part of the fiacial model creatig greater expectatios of flexibility o behalf of exteral advisors to esure their iput ad effort are commesurate with the cliet s eed. As a result of these factors it is becomig icreasigly importat for exteral lawyers to have both a i-depth uderstadig of their cliets busiess as well as a good grasp of their processes. It is oly i this way that the cliet ad its legal advisers will be able to work effectively as a itegrated team. While excellece of legal advice remais critical, how a firm works ca, i fact, be a sigificat differetiator. Uderstadig law as a process Almost ay task that has a begiig, a middle ad a ed ca be costrued as a process, icludig the practice of law. However, the threshold challege for applyig Cotiuous Improvemet i this idustry is that lawyers historically have ot bee traied to look at the work they do as a process. This ca be traced back to law s heritage as a professioal appreticeship. Traiee lawyers lear by observig how more seior lawyers operate; the focus is o the acquisitio of kowledge ad expertise, rather tha uderstadig the how or why of service delivery. The result is ot a lack of process, but fewer fully stadardised processes. Whe applyig Cotiuous Improvemet i the legal sector, the, the first step must ivolve brigig everyoe together to map out a agreed ad stadard process for deliverig the give task, creatig a foudatio for improvemet. This ofte challeges those ivolved to thik about what they do o a daily basis, ad have ofte doe over may years, i a completely ew way. The output of this highly iteractive sessio is a process map which acts both as a visual istructio maual ad a framework for orgaisig kowledge resources related to the relevat task. We have observed that a valuable additioal beefit is that the process mappig sessios ofte become teachig sessios, as more seior lawyers share their deal experiece ad wisdom with their juior colleagues. Startig with recogisable processes Some processes are easily idetified ad uderstood; some are repeated may hudreds of times. Eve i a firm such as, which focuses o complex legal services, frequetly tailored to idividual cliets, processes of this sort exist. A example is our Boud Volumes project (see case study), which is where we started our Cotiuous Improvemet programme. I these cases, it is possible to collect robust data ad the to draw o the etire process improvemet toolkit, usig the detail of cocepts such as flow ad pull to idetify bottleecks ad smooth the way i, Jauary 2014

6 6 Applyig Cotiuous Improvemet to high-ed legal services Idividual lawyers sometimes at a more juior level but who are very close to a particular type of process experiece a level of frustratio that causes them to seek help i creatig a chage. I all cases, there eeds to be agreemet that there is a problem ad support for effectig chage. This is particularly importat i the matrixed law firm partership structure that makes it hard to idetify cetrally those processes i eed of improvemet. which work moves betwee the differet idividuals ivolved. These types of projects are also ofte relatively easy to measure, with clearly demostrable beefits. Idetifyig broader opportuities for improvemet The challege i a less commoditised service eviromet, such as at Clifford Chace, is that legal processes are rarely repetitive or cosistet. For example, there is o such thig as a average M&A trasactio the amout of time take, or the cost, ca vary cosiderably from oe matter to the ext depedig o a vast rage of factors. What is more, although law firms collect a lot of iformatio icludig extesive time recordig for each matter the data poits are ofte isufficietly graular to support detailed aalysis of trasactios. Although data aalysis ca idetify areas for improvemet, we fid that the majority of projects surface through oe of three routes: Seior lawyers with extesive experiece ad a strog grasp of the firm s operatioal dyamics highlight areas for improvemet, sometimes based o cliet feedback Market expectatios udergo a sigificat shift, causig the cliet ad its advisers to revisit how quickly, or at what cost, a trasactio ca be completed Makig chage happe All our projects follow the stadard Cotiuous Improvemet methodology: defie, measure, aalyse, improve ad cotrol. The first stage ivolves scopig a possible project to verify that there is a opportuity for improvemet. This icludes securig buy-i from all the stakeholders ivolved: projects have little chace of success uless everyoe agrees to participate ad is willig to fid a solutio. We the baselie the curret performace of the process. If the project is about cost, this will ivolve Case study Chagig the way the cliet operates It is easy for private practice lawyers to believe that iefficiecies are iheret to a trasactio, because the process is believed to reflect cliet eeds. This was the case whe we started a project reviewig a particular type of asset disposal we work o regularly for oe of our cliets. Durig the aalysis, we idetified a umber of opportuities for improvemet, icludig some chages that the cliet eeded to make. We took our aalysis ad recommedatios to the cliet ad they were ameable to the proposed chages, icludig a suggestio that a differet team at their ed should be ivolved i some aspects of the trasactio. Havig implemeted chages o both sides, these asset disposals are much smoother ad cheaper for everyoe ivolved., Jauary 2014

7 Applyig Cotiuous Improvemet to high-ed legal services 7 uderstadig how much these matters typically cost whereas, if the project is about speed, it will ivolve measurig how log these egagemets last. Give the relative lack of comparable hard data about differet matters, the project team eeds to be quite flexible ad creative i fidig the right iputs for this measuremet, ad i the approach it takes to the subsequet aalysis. While this may mea that the project is ofte tackled at a relatively high level, we have geerally foud that this is where the greatest iefficiecies exist. We the covee all the relevat parties to aalyse the process i depth, ad to idetify the root causes of the problem. This ivolves brigig together a group of idividuals from differet offices, practice groups ad levels of seiority from the lead parter to the most juior traiee. This requires a sigificat ivestmet both from the firm ad from the idividuals ivolved as the aalysis workshops usually ru over a few days. These sessios are facilitated by Cotiuous Improvemet experts (at we employ a team of four full-time specialists supported by a umber of part-time specialists that we have traied iterally) ad coclude with a list of improvemets ad a agreed set of actios required to support those improvemets. The fial stage of the project ivolves makig sure that the improvemets are sustaied, ad sharig them with other teams that might beefit. This has proved the most challegig aspect of our Cotiuous Improvemet implemetatio as the orgaisatio of the firm aroud cliets ad matters does ot easily fit with the cocept of havig a process ower that is resposible for the ogoig implemetatio ad moitorig of the improvemets. Although there is still room for improvemet, our greatest successes i this area have ivolved allocatig resposibility for owig best practice methodologies to oe or more seior associates. Workig with cliets As the most effective Cotiuous Improvemet projects are the result of collaboratio across all of the actors i a process, workig directly with cliets is a obvious step. This esures that the cliets eeds are reflected i the ew process. At, we actively seek cliet participatio whe examiig the ed-to-ed process o regular legal madates. It is these joit projects that have idetified the greatest improvemets to the value chai. May of our cliet orgaisatios have their ow Cotiuous Improvemet teams, with whom we are happy to egage. However, the i-house legal fuctio has ot always bee a priority for this type of work. Moreover, because i-house lawyers, as much as their private practice couterparts, may ot always recogise the possibilities for process improvemet, the opportuities ad beefits eed to be set out i a way that is meaigful to their particular operatig cotext. While we ofte ask cliets to provide their perspective o processes we revise, we are icreasigly seeig a appetite for a more holistic approach where the cliet s ivolvemet is fully itegrated ito the Cotiuous Improvemet project, where a group of our lawyers ad several represetatives of the cliet come together to map out the process ad look for the potetial efficiecies. Case study Workig with a cliet to speed up regular trasactios Through our discussios with a key bakig cliet, we became aware that a regular trasactio we perform for them was takig loger tha was ideal. We agreed with the cliet that improvemets could be made ad kicked off a joit Cotiuous Improvemet project. A itesive two day workshop, atteded by Clifford Chace parters ad associates ad three represetatives from the cliet, aalysed every step i the existig process, with the help of two of our Cotiuous Improvemet specialists. The workshop idetified the causes of delays ad agreed chages to be made o both sides. Sice implemetig the chages, may of these trasactios are completig up to 40% faster tha before. Moreover, our two teams ow uderstad each other better ad are workig together i a more joied up way. The outcomes from this collaborative approach are geerally sigificat, beefitig all parties ad helpig to forge a stroger cliet/adviser relatioship. Evaluatig results The beefit secured from each Cotiuous Improvemet project will deped o its specific focus. Some projects are cocetrated aroud fiacial metrics, cosiderig how improved efficiecy ad better maagemet of a process ca reduce the amout charged to a cliet, or miimise write-offs o a particular type of trasactio. These projects ofte lead to a improvemet of 15% or more, sometimes sigificatly more., Jauary 2014

8 8 Applyig Cotiuous Improvemet to high-ed legal services The programme teaches participats how to apply simple Cotiuous Improvemet tools to diagose the iefficiecies they routiely face ad to make plas as idividuals, as matter teams ad as practice groups to start tacklig them from the very ext day. The course is broadly equivalet to a yellow belt i Cotiuous Improvemet i other idustries. Other projects primarily focus o speed. Improvig the speed of a process sometimes by up to 50% ca brig valuable advatages to all parties ivolved, ot just reducig cost ad delay but improvig service, sometimes to the beefit of our cliet s ow customers. A additioal advatage of Cotiuous Improvemet projects is ofte somethig more difficult to evaluate but valuable oetheless: a certai smoothess i the process, with more clarity ad certaity about roles ad resposibilities, miimal duplicatio of effort ad, overall, creatig a more coheret ad maageable experiece. Over the past five years, we have proved that this approach works across a wide spectrum of deal types icludig high value ad more customised trasactios, such as M&A, real estate acquisitios ad disposals, large-scale asset fiace ad cross-border loas ad restructurigs. We have also see that may teams have bee able to apply the improvemets, ad beefits, from oe project to other similar types of work. While the variety of outcomes ca make the overall fiacial busiess case for Cotiuous Improvemet hard to track, it is very apparet that these projects brig real beefits to cliets, ad therefore also to our ow busiess. Buildig a efficiecy culture The more widely deployed Cotiuous Improvemet techiques are, the greater the umber, size ad value of beefits that ca be secured. As a result, embeddig this way of thikig ito orgaisatioal culture will ulock the greatest opportuities. To do this effectively, traiig is required across a broad rage of relevat idividuals workig o key processes it caot be allowed to exist i a silo. I a law firm, this meas it is critical to brig all of our lawyers o board. While about 450 of our associates ad parters have already bee ivolved i Cotiuous Improvemet projects, we are ow rollig out a ambitious traiig programme that will help all our lawyers to apply the techiques to their work. Durig the course, the lawyers apply what they have leart to a case study that is directly relevat to their work, meaig participats immediately uderstad the relevace of the tools. We ofte fid that teams start developig more efficiet ways of workig before the course eve eds. By the ed of April 2014, we pla for about 20% of our lawyers to have bee traied, with the ambitio that all of our lawyers will be traied over the comig years. Similar traiig programmes, icludig yellow belt ad gree belt courses i Cotiuous Improvemet, are also ru for members of our Busiess Services teams. There are a umber of sigs that our pioeerig ivestmet is helpig us to build a efficiecy culture : Idividual lawyers subscribe to the overall philosophy ( I should be more efficiet ) Lawyers apply the techiques of Cotiuous Improvemet to their day-to-day tasks Teams collaborate to esure idividual cliet matters are maaged efficietly Groups come together to address process improvemets aroud types of matters, seekig immediate ad sustaiable improvemets across a whole category of work, Jauary 2014

9 Applyig Cotiuous Improvemet to high-ed legal services 9 People suggest more large-scale project ideas that are facilitated by the cetral Cotiuous Improvemet team. Embeddig this type of culture results i improvemets i procedures, templates ad cliet plaig, with the outcome that lawyers focus o cosistet ad outstadig cliet service, as well as the best legal advice. The future Based o our positive experieces to date, we expect the jourey towards icreased efficiecy, supported by Cotiuous Improvemet methodologies, to cotiue to gather pace. Cotiuous Improvemet will, at some poit, chage from beig somethig that we do to the way we work ad will simply become the way we work. This will ivolve a eve greater focus o uderstadig the cliet s particular requiremets for each piece of work. We expect to see our legal teams icreasigly icorporated ito the cliet s team, ot as a supplier or exteral adviser, but as a itegral elemet of the trasactio. This type of thikig will brig our lawyers closer to their cliets ad their way of thikig. Our best lawyers already have strog commercial sese a focus o efficiecy reiforces that uderstadig, ad helps them to develop greater busiess awareess across their etire teams ad from earlier o i a lawyer s career. Eve at the high ed, where legal work is characterised by complexity, it will become more project maaged ad process-drive with procedures i place to measure ad cotrol the performace of each step i the process. As a result of this icreased trasparecy of process, we are likely to see greater ivolvemet of a rage of talet from withi the law firm with professioals, other tha lawyers, brigig their particular area of expertise ad Cotiuous Improvemet skills to bear i the effective delivery of legal services. A deeper uderstadig of the legal process, ad greater trasparecy about the steps ivolved, may also be a driver for a fudametal shift i the way i which law firms ad their cliets value ad price legal services. Cotiuous Improvemet may have bee a log time comig to legal services but we fully believe it will become itegral to how may private practice ad i-house teams work over the ext few years., Jauary 2014

10 10 Applyig Cotiuous Improvemet to high-ed legal services About is oe of the world s pre-emiet law firms with sigificat depth ad rage of resources across five cotiets. As a sigle, fully itegrated, global partership, we pride ourselves o our approachable, collegiate ad team based way of workig. We always strive to exceed the expectatios of our cliets, which iclude corporates from all the commercial ad idustrial sectors, govermets, regulators, trade bodies ad ot for profit orgaisatios. We provide them with the highest quality advice ad legal isight, which combies the firm s global stadards with i-depth local expertise. Differet ways of workig at has a well-established track record of itroducig ew ways of workig to keep the firm at the leadig edge of the high-ed legal sector. The firm was oe of the first i its idustry to offshore busiess support fuctios, settig up a service cetre i Idia i This cetre ow employs 18% of the firm s o-secretarial busiess services staff, coverig areas such as research, admiistratio, HR ad fiace. The firm also has a dedicated group of 60 cosultats at its Kowledge Cetre for Trasactio ad Case Support i Idia which provides support to our legal teams globally o a wide rage of matters. The Kowledge Cetre eables us to esure that routie tasks are maaged to Clifford Chace s high stadards, but efficietly ad at miimal cost. Author Oliver Campbell Global Head of Busiess Trasformatio Oliver rus our Cotiuous Improvemet programme ad has resposibility for developig ad implemetig strategic chage iitiatives at, to icrease value to the firm s cliets ad to make the firm s iteral processes ad systems more efficiet. Oliver is a qualified solicitor, havig traied at, ad previously practised as a medical doctor. T: E: oliver.campbell@cliffordchace.com, Jauary 2014

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