Issue link: https://epubs.iltanet.org/i/7694
ILTA White Paper The Business of Law 26 Robbin's Client Development and Growth Practice concurs. By treating people internally with the same respect lawyers treat their clients, firms can build incredible loyalty within legal teams and throughout the organization. From an improvement standpoint, instead of simply trying to cut costs, Lean strives for growth through the enlarged capacity of more effective processes. For instance, in a legal context, a real estate client might want to reduce the time required to negotiate and close contracts and leases in order to open more stores within a certain period of time. Using Lean methods, lawyers would first map the legal process and then identify and remove activities, such as negotiating certain provisions, which do not add value from the client's perspective. Attorneys would then reorganize the remaining activities to minimize the interruptions, wait time and unnecessary transfer of information in the workflow. Supervising lawyers would also identify which activities should be assigned to associates and paralegals to maximize value to the client. Since 20 percent of the activities typically cause 80 percent of the delay, as George notes, increasing the speed of a small percentage of the work has a disproportionately positive effect on quality and cost. Thus, increasing the proportion of valued-added activities in the workflow (process efficiency) and organizing the process more effectively (cycle time) results in faster lease closings and more store openings. STrengTh in nuMBerS In addition to being a statistical concept, Six Sigma is a business philosophy that addresses the need for short-term gains while developing talent and improving operations. In his book The New Six Sigma, Tom McCarty, former Vice President of Consulting and Training Services at Motorola University, underscores the importance of understanding the Voice of the Customer (VOC) by emphasizing that teams should describe their perception of client expectations early on in an engagement. In a 2009 ABA paper, Betsy Collins noted that because "every discovery project is different, it is important and relatively easy to implement the 'voice of the customer' Six Sigma application into your projects. It's simply good business to pay attention to how your client wants to frame the scope of the project and what they view as the crucial elements." When nearly every industry survey of client service has identified a large gap between attorney perception and actual client satisfaction, improving attorney's capabilities in this area helps reconnect costs to the value of services. By learning how to identify, interview and survey stakeholders and prioritize their value propositions, "in addition to being a statistical concept, Six Sigma is a business philosophy that addresses the need for short-term gains while developing talent and improving operations."