Driving business transformation using legal technology

As the world evolves, it’s important for businesses to also keep up with the change. Today’s consumer is  tech-savvy and used to faster and/or newer ways of doing the same things and therefore, we are seeing  many businesses undergo a digital transformation to align themselves with the changing market  dynamics to maintain their competitive edge. 

Business transformation, if generalised and (over)simplified, involves making strategic, operational and  fundamental changes to the way a business is conducted. The transformation could be driven by a  business’ need to address its underlying problems or to cope up with the changing market conditions or  its desire to alter the vision and direction of the business or a combination of these.  

Such transformation may include structured and collaborative changes to business processes, systems,  teams or departments and this includes legal too. 

Why is legal important in this change?  

For a business to operate without any hindrances, it must abide by many laws, comply with several regulations and conduct its business in accordance with the numerous terms agreed with its internal  and external stakeholders. Moreover, each business must also define and abide by its own principles  and standards which are set in place to create an ethical, stable, and healthy work environment. However, with time, laws, regulations, practices and standards change too and this makes the role of a  legal department so crucial for the growth of any business. Additionally, many General Counsels are also actively involved in the strategic decision-making of the business, aiding business growth through their  expert understanding of the complex business laws, regulations and legal procedures. Therefore, to  remain efficient, competitive and sustainable, businesses must invest in modernising and empowering their legal departments. 

What, then, is legal transformation?  

Introduction of technology in legal departments also benefits the business whole, from ensuring  business continuity to complying with laws, improving business environment, finalizing contracts,  protecting business interests, etc. Hence, many legal departments have undergone a transformation to  improve their own operations. Legal Transformation is amalgamating people, processes and data under  one umbrella to support legal operations and to significantly improve the way legal departments  function. It also enables the organisation to function effortlessly in the new external environment of the  day by unifying the various sub-functions of the legal department and integrating it with the rest of the  the organisation. Legal transformation typically involves three steps: 

∙ Shifting from manual to digital operations across the entire legal function 

∙ Digitising and automating cross-functional and external coordination. 

∙ Implementing a system of centralised data, document handling and workflows

The key advantage of digitisation and technology in the legal function is more efficient, easier, faster and  simpler operational processes enabling faster yet simpler business. Technology enables people to  connect faster and collaborate better, enabling simpler ways to doing business. This involves, in a birds’  eye view, connecting all the constituent functions of corporate legal departments in a single platform,  called Enterprise Legal Management (ELM). This is a system which connects the entire contract  management, matter management, compliances, legal spend etc seamlessly, while also integrating  these with the organisational systems. 

Outlining and planning the change  

It is imperative to chart the current status of the processes, operations and data formats of the  organisation – are they fully manual, or have some basic automation been done? What are the  interconnections with other departments and external parties? The organisational strategy and current  challenges have also to be considered. These two will enable the charting of the precise steps to be  undertaken, a prioritised list of the pain points of the organisation.  

Prioritisation is essential so that the change is smooth, and does not hamper current operations. For  example, if the key challenge is the back-end onboarding of new partners is taking time in a fast moving  unicorn startup, the first step could be a savvy rapid online onboarding processes including, self-service  contracting; this enables smooth and fast onboarding of all stakeholders. Alternatively, the pain point  could be regulatory compliance in a highly regulated industry.  

This is the second level of transformation, wherein the key pain point has been addressed – now the  task is to proceed and incorporate technology throughout the legal function. In the example above, it  could include standard templatised contracts, documents, a centralised repository of all contracts and  documents, as well as Realtime online Compliance and Entity management systems to ensure the  company is fully compliant and up to date with the regulations meaning further risk reduction and  business agility. One can also have an up-to-date centralised legal matter management module ensures  dispute management, keeping the risks further on the lower side, a key advantage in a changing and  demanding environment.  

Once all the operations of the legal teams have been automated, the only task that remains in the  transformation exercise is internal and external collaborative systems, fully integrated into other  organisational systems, people and processes across sales, finance, marketing and HR functions. 

How does this enable business transformation?  

As the market conditions and consumer expectations have changed; business transformation is  essentially helping the business meet this new reality. The organisation cannot hope to achieve this by  just giving at-par-with-the-best operational processes that are hampered by traditional legal interfaces;  the entire customer journey starting from first contract through to lifelong experience with the  organisation and/or its products/services needs to be aligned to that. 

If a compliance foul-up interrupts service, or if a matter management is traditional in an otherwise  modern organisation, it places a point of dissonance in the customer journey With the information flow  being so open nowadays, this could be a reason for a shift in customer loyalties. Hence, there is  definitely a centrality of legal in the business transformation paradigm. . In fact, Legaltech systems which handle matters within the legal departments of corporates, can also integrate with the Practice  Management suites in law firms with the proper customisations. This can save a lot of time and add  productive benefits. 

A fast-changing external environment requires an agile business model, one that changes in response to  or in anticipation of these changes; and is in direct touch on a personal basis with clients. It also needs  dismantling silos between partners / clients and the organisation, as well as within departments,  facilitating collaboration that enables faster business in a more comfortable setting for the customer.  The traditional models of business processes simply cannot cope with these diverse new needs on them.  

This is where legal technology brings unparalleled flexibility and agility into the business model,  becoming a key cog in the engine of business transformation. For example, a single change in regulation  or business reality that requires thousands of contracts to be changed – a Legaltech platform can ensure  that in next to no time. Or a collaborative discussion in real-time between two organisations can be  facilitated by a Legaltech ecosystem, which speeds up the entire. The two examples above prove how a  legal technology platform brings in responsiveness to change, as well as speeding up processes.  

Thus, legal connects all the parts of an organisation brings them within a connected ecosystem externally as well as internally, providing a field, as it were, for smooth operations on which the basis of  a strong organisation and positive relationships can be built. It connects every aspect of the business  end-to-end, with its contracts, cases, compliance and documentation etc parameters. A seamless  digitised platform clearly is an important first step in breaking down the above-mentioned silos,  enabling freer information within a secure modern framework yet that provides an ultra-modern  collaborative space set in a savvy interface – thereby becoming a key important milestone in the journey  towards digital transformation.

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