June 2010 Archives

Juicy bite-sized morsels of legal project management from the week ending Saturday, June 26, 2010. Ron Friedman chides Biglaw for not embracing working virtually in his Strategic Legal Technology Blog. And that concludes another week of Legal Project Management. See you next week!...

According to a survey conducted by RecommindRecommind, an e-discovery-tool vendor, the disconnect between IT and legal is getting worse:  While legal and IT have been historically disparate, the exponential increase in content creation and the rising complexities and risks of eDiscovery and regulatory scrutiny have inexorably linked the needs and responsibilities of each department.... Recommind's survey reveals that communication between legal and IT has become decidedly worse in 2010.[1] It seems years of hand-wringing on this issue is doing little to move these two camps closer together. But, as I've discussed before, the growing trend of legal-project management provides our best...

Juicy bite-sized morsels of legal project management from the week ending Saturday, June 19, 2010. Sourcing expert Andrew Bartolini discusses the "new normal" in legal sourcing in a recent post to his CPO Rising blog. He shares thoughts about a recent discussion he had with "partner in the corporate section of the business services group of a large law firm based on the west coast of the US." Some of the more salient points made in the post include:While his friend's law firm is not seeing the involvement of procurement during the bid process for new legal business, he "noted that procurement is...

The Cowen Group has just released a snapshot of its fourth annual salary survey for litigation support professionals and the job market for litigation-support project managers is looking strong.[1] Their salary findings support their predictions in their "Critical Trends" report, published in January, which noted the increasing need for litigation-support project managers, stating that the role "will gain greater prominence in the industry due to the increasing size of datasets and heightened concern around controlling cost, limiting risks, and guaranteeing  outcomes."[2] According to this survey, salaries are projected to increase by eight to fifteen percent. Unsurprisingly, salaries are highest in the Eastern...

On June 23rd, LexisNexis will present a virtual panel on the "discipline and benefits of project management" as part of its "The Business of Litigation" series.[1] Title: The Discipline and Benefits of Project ManagementFormat: on-line CLE Cost: FREEOrganizations: LexisNexis LexisNexis and Adam Smith, Esq.Host: LexisNexisModerator:  Kevin Stehr, Vice-President, LexisNexis Litigation & Research SolutionsPanelists include:Tom Birsic, Partner and Litigation Practice Leader, K&L GatesJamie A. Brown, Director, Fennemore Craig, P.C.David Burt, DuPont Corporate CounselRick Rose, General Counsel, Calgon CarbonOther panelists to be announcedDate:  June 23, 2010, 2:00pm ETDescription: Project management is nothing more than rationally supervising the process of (a) deploying resources (b)...

Juicy bite-sized morsels of legal project management from the week ending Saturday, June 12, 2010. TextSteven Levy takes a break from baseball and golf analogies and compares projects to organic carrots: Carrots grow in the ground. They do not come evenly shaped, at specific weights in plastic bags. Likewise, projects do not come all packaged, clean and ready-to-eat. A good project manager may make them appear that way to management and the team members working on the project, but they don't come shrink-wrapped. His point is that new project managers shouldn't be scared away by their first project, which will...

Wouldn't it be nice if when planning your legal project, your matter-management software prompted you with questions and suggestions that draw upon your firm's collective pool of experience and body of knowledge? Tax preparation software offers such functionality to assist people preparing tax forms, but this would clearly be impossible for the planning of an entire complex litigation...or would it?The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) is currently developing software to help military-mission planners make better decisions. The mission-optimization software program is titled OBTW, initials for "Oh By The Way," and is inspired by the guided decision-making featured in tax-preparation software: OBTW is...

How do project managers obtain not mere competence, not mere qualifications, but excellence in their work? You've earned your PMP. So what? Whether you made the effort to get recognition of your expertise or because you feel it will help your career, it is still just a check box. Something that an employer or client might look for or notice and look upon favorably--perhaps even require. Still, there are a lot of PMPs and more are being pumped out each year. It is still a big pack to stand out from. Too many people obtain one credential or another and feel entitled...

You can now subscribe to this blog on your Kindle. If you own a Kindle or use the Amazon Kindle app on the iPhone. While the content of this blog remains free at this Web site and through your favorite feed reader, some people prefer reading blog content on e-book readers. ...

Blawger Hanna Hasl-Kelchner (of the Legal Literacy blawg) is presenting a complimentary teleseminar, "How to Control Outside Legal Spending," on June 16, 2010 at 8 pm Eastern.[1] She will interview Rob Thomas, Vice President, Strategic Development for Serengeti Law, a legal billing and matter management SaaS service.[2] They will discuss how to align legal spending with your budget, and your business goals. One of the main topics they will discuss is how to align budgets with project management.[3] Registration for this event is unconventional. To register you must visit askthenononsenselawyer.com, listen to a short audio recording, and "submit your single most important...

Juicy bite-sized morsels of legal project management from the week ending Saturday, June 05, 2010. In a post to his Lean Law blawg, D. Mark Jackson asks whether an "Andon" system might have prevented the Gulf oil spill. An Andon system is a "a Lean [manufacturing] tool that allows line level workers to signal for help, and if necessary, stop production in order to correct a defect or problem." Jackson points out that an insufficient buffer in the warning and shut down system and a lack of a culture of respect could have created the conditions that lead to a delay...