publication of the International Legal Technology Association
Issue link: https://epubs.iltanet.org/i/535467
ILTA WHITE PAPER: JUNE 2015 WWW.ILTANET.ORG 38 EFFICIENCY CHALLENGE: PRIORITIZE PROJECTS THAT DELIVER MORE VALUE LET'S TALK ABOUT BENEFITS! Do you know how you will measure success? Will your firm and/or clients get more out of your project than it costs you to put in? If so, how much more? If not, is it possible to expand the scope to a broader set of clients or users to gain more of a benefit? Your goal is to find a few key metrics to use to report and measure your success after the project is complete. These will be unique for each project, but try and make them quantifiable. Examples include revenue increase, time savings or increase in relationship engagement. Are you going to help clients sleep better, save them money by doing something in an automated way, make them money by helping them spot opportunities or make them look good by improving your success together? What are the indicators of this? If you need data to measure success, make sure you have accounted for this in your project evaluation costs. At the conclusion of the project, be able to say you invested this much money, time and manpower with xyz outcome three months, six months and one year after project completion. PRIORITIZE BY VALUE Adopting this type of model across your project assessments with an eye on delivering projects that have the highest impact on client value will make you more effective at allocating scarce internal resources. Remember to ask questions about how the project will benefit clients and how benefits will be measured. The legal industry is increasingly competitive, but innovative projects with clearly communicated benefits will help your firm beat the efficiency challenge. Stack the Equation in Favor of Your Project An equation that can measure client value is: Here are six tips to stack the equation in your favor: Drive down infrastructure costs by mapping existing systems Speed up your time to market with off-the-shelf solutions or SaaS Reduce resource requirements by filling in data gaps with purchased data Investigate integration engines and application program interfaces (APIs) to ease data connections and save resources Drive up benefit by designing applications for multiple client groups Communicate broadly about the benefits your project will provide Client Benefits — Firm Resources Project Value