Latest Article in Hampshire Legal (Official Journal of The Hampshire Law Society)

The speed of change in the world is unprecedented. The nature in which firms provide legal services will change, the way they are structured and operate will be vital to respond to these changes. This presents challenges and opportunities for those prepared to embrace new ways of working, new technology and an evolving workforce.

The challenges:

• Disruptive technology and ‘off the shelf’ routine legal services assisted by artificial intelligence and robotic process automation potentially displacing the role of the lawyer and transforming the way clients use services
• Changes in relationship between service providers and clients, lower competitive barriers to entry and the way we communicate, collaborate and work will influence the client experience
• How we engage with and build trusted relationships with current and prospective clients with increased expectations will be essential to maintain net fee growth
• Creating the right first impression and demonstrating greater transparency and value for money through the service provided in a climate of fixed fee and lowest-cost provider selection
• Understanding the ‘voice of the customer’ and what creates satisfaction along with effective relationship management processes to increase engagement and loyalty
• Experienced partners that become ‘accidental’ managers without the same professional development in leadership, strategic thinking, team management and operational excellence as their legal/technical disciplines.

How then can the successful legal service firms of tomorrow evolve and adapt to their competitive, fixed-fee environment to be fit for the future with greater productivity leading to profitable growth?

• Better use of technology to prevent workarounds, work organisation redesign, combining resources and standardising processes to balance workloads and increase utilisation of fee earners and paralegal staff
• Identifying where in the journey we can add more value, reduce customer effort to enhance collaboration, share information better and improve the client experience
• Reducing write-offs, identifying avoidable demand and introducing better quality controls to ensure work is completed right first time
• Effective resourcing, performance management and better information for planning and scheduling to ensure performance is efficient and aligned to strategy
• Engage and train partners and staff to drive continuous improvement of performance by investing in their capability to practically apply appropriate tools and techniques

ChangeWise believes employee engagement is critical to successful change and by training and coaching your people to use simple continuous improvement techniques they can embed change into the way they work and continuously adapt to a constantly changing competitive environment. Call Mike Williams on 07866 537 580 to find out more.

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