Following on from John's post last week, something close to my heart - Legal Project Management, or more precisely, the struggle involved to implement Legal Project Management (LPM).
Law firms and law departments sometimes struggle when seeking to make changes. Nowhere is this more evident than in law firm and law department efforts to implement legal project management techniques.
The scale of the task can often feel daunting, but luckily there are a number of examples that can help steer us in the right direction. Through a combination of learning from others who have already started with LPM initiatives, and by also taking advantage of what you already know, you should be in a great starting position. We're also fortunate in that there is a general consensus amongst legal commentators factors lead to a successful LPM implementation, neatly summed up into ten key themes.
The ten key themes identified may be summarized as follows:
- Spend a lot of time at the 'front-end' – in other words, work out from the outset what you are trying to achieve, and then focus only on these elements. As a number of early adopters discovered, 'you can't do what you don’t define'
- Your LPM approach should be designed to live with your firm's culture, your firm's strategy, and (if a law firm) your firm's clients
- Identify powerful (and credible!) champions, and secure visible commitment from leadership for the short, mid and long term (also it is good to make sure that all the key players understand what is being done and are committed to it!)
- Focus on those areas where you can make a real difference. For example, this may mean initially limiting your initiative to areas where adopting LPM approach's techniques couldimprove efficiency
- Any approach needs to focus on your lawyers' 'right now needs'. It needs to deliver immediate benefit otherwise it will not be adopted (Top tip: training should go short on the theory, long on the hands-on practice)
- 'One size does not fit all' -any training or approach needs to be tailored to the relevant group, team or specific matter (but alongside some common principles)
- Training needs to be done in parallel with developing the appropriate tools and infrastructure, otherwise expectation surpasses reality (and that is where frustration kicks in!)
- Get some quick wins on the board and actively publicize the success (this helps build a healthy degree of competition amongst participating lawyers!)
- Don’t be frightened of technology, but do adopt it appropriately
- and above all, 'keep it simple'.
Best of luck in your efforts,
#ProjectManagement #BusinessandFinancialManagement