Impactful Innovation

This session, moderated by Ari Kaplan, delves into "Impactful Innovation" with panelists Jennifer Mendez and Dina Traugot, focusing on defining innovation and measuring its business results within legal operations.   

Key Takeaways:

• Defining Innovation: Innovation is more than just adopting the latest technology; it's about introducing new methods or ideas that enhance existing processes, services, and products to generate value and effectively solve problems.   

   

• Creating a Culture of Innovation: Making innovation tangible involves fostering a community and generating energy around it, embracing the process's inherent messiness, and recognizing and rewarding innovative efforts.   

   

• Driving Innovation in Law Firms: Encouraging an innovation mindset in law firms requires tackling easily achievable goals to gain early successes, promoting those wins, and cultivating a culture that views failures as learning opportunities.   

   

• Measuring the Value of Innovation: Communicating the value of innovation involves tailoring the message to different audiences, such as firm leadership, attorneys, and clients, and using metrics, including both quantitative and qualitative measures, to substantiate claims of success.   

   

• Cross-functional Collaboration: Innovation should be collaborative, involving various stakeholders within and sometimes outside the legal department, to maximize learning and impact.   

   

• Automation and Efficiency: Identifying opportunities for automation involves pinpointing friction points and manual steps in legal tasks to streamline processes and improve efficiency.   

   

• Generative AI in Legal: While generative AI is a hot topic, it's crucial to first define the problem and determine if generative AI is the appropriate solution, as sometimes other tools or processes may be more suitable.   

   

• Training and Change Management: Effective training is essential for promoting innovation adoption, and it should be tailored to different audiences and delivered in various formats, including just-in-time training and microlearning modules.   

   

• Build vs. Buy Decisions: The decision to build or buy a technology solution should be based on a clear understanding of the desired outcomes and a thorough evaluation of the pros and cons, rather than solely focusing on the tool itself.   

   

• Advice for Driving Innovation: Key recommendations for driving innovation include starting with a clearly defined problem, securing buy-in from senior leadership, fostering autonomy, and embracing the messiness of the innovation process.