Mike Russell\u2019s career in legal IT has spanned decades, from the \u201cdark ages\u201d of legal technology to the explosion of modern-day legal IT. In his role building the legal operations team at Expedia Group, Mike strives to show that a solid legal ops team can provide better information to drive better business decisions. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
We really enjoyed our discussion with Mike about the future of legal operations. We hope you enjoy reading about Mike\u2019s journey!<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Mike Russell: A life-long technology nerd and learner, I started tinkering with electronics and computers as a \u201cchild of the 80s,\u201d and was lucky to work for one of the early Silicon Valley software companies (Informix, now part of IBM) followed by a year with the USDOT which involved supporting government attorneys. From there, a consulting gig led to a first career as a law firm IT director with a couple of mid-sized firms back in the \u201cdark ages\u201d of Novell networks and WordPerfect. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Coming out of the Y2K wave of projects and through my years of involvement with the International Legal Technology Association (ILTA), I have my peer network to thank for a connection that led to my first in-house corporate legal opportunity with Liberty Mutual. I spent 15 years with that fantastic team, doing all the things we know today as legal operations back when eBilling was a new concept and long before the LegalTech ecosystem came to be. Later, I took a leap of faith and spent 6 years creating the legal operations function at what was then known as Ingersoll-Rand (now Trane Technologies). Mid-pandemic in 2020, always up for a challenge, I once again jumped headfirst into my current role, establishing and building legal operations here at Expedia Group.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
MR: To be successful, Legal Ops teams must be good change agents. Not change or tech just for the sake of it; rather, telling a story that starts with why a process should be changed \u2013 the underpinnings of continuous improvement \u2013 which almost always involves a combination of people, process, and technology.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
While budgets and resources generally are often a big challenge, the ability to see around corners a bit and build a successful business case will help mitigate those blockers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
MR: All of these things are key to visual management and informed decision-making. It\u2019s often said that many organizations are data-rich, but information-poor. Legal Ops is the key to using the data science and analytical skills to make things actionable. We seek to illustrate trends, expose gaps \u2013 abnormal vs. normal \u2013 and let decision makers know whether a given datapoint is as expected or an outlier.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
MR: The ability of an in-house corporate legal department to leverage law companies as an extension of their team gives them so much flexibility and ability to be nimble when business needs (or unexpected legal curveballs like litigation or regulation) demand it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
There will always be a place for outside counsel to represent their client, but as we know, so much of our work can be disaggregated and compartmentalized into chunks of work assigned to the right resource at the right cost to reach the desired outcome.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
MR: Most definitely, advanced enterprise legal management (ELM) platforms enable collaboration by all involved team members, regardless of location or organization. Robust workflow technologies provide automation from the moment an organization is served with a lawsuit to triage and route\/assign matters to the correct resource. Managing thousands of litigated claims in the insurance and product liability\/mass tort sectors accelerated my application of technology at scale to manage a book of business like that. Applying advanced analytics and utilizing historical outcome data to help predict where a given matter may land gives in-house legal teams excellent insight and saves money by ensuring outside counsel is only performing truly value-added work versus simply churning through cases.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
MR: The ability to connect and learn from peers is invaluable. I mentioned having been involved with ILTA (established in the 1980s as a Wang user group) since 1994, when a few hundred people would gather annually to share how we were facing various challenges \u2013 including being able to bond together and influence vendor product roadmaps, such as with Microsoft before Word was capable enough to be the de facto standard. Over the years, the establishment of the ACC Legal Operations group, CLOC, Legal Innovators Network (LINK), Legal Operators, and Summit on Legal Innovation & Disruption (SOLID) have exponentially connected the overall legal ecosystem.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Whether you or your role (or both) are brand new, you can truly find your tribe through these organizations. CLOC, having embraced the entire legal ecosystem over the last couple of years, has really made it possible for an entire industry to collaborate and improve what we\u2019re doing, how we do it, and the tools we use.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
MR: Though it dates back to Seneca circa 65 AD, it is believed that Michelangelo at age 87 said, \u201cI am still learning\u2026\u201d<\/em> when painting St. Peter\u2019s. This comes to life in our industry given that no matter how long one has been involved, there is always something to learn and new ways to improve legal service delivery.<\/p>\n\n\n\n