Blog Post

Key Takeaways From The 21st ACLA Conference

June 12, 2017

Simon By SIMON MEIKLEJOHN – Associate Director


Legal outsourcing today brings you solutions to address the changing demands and needs of your clients. It is now considered a key element in implementing ‘alternate delivery models’. They are indeed changing the game too.

 


Exigent

 Image Copyright:  ACLA Australia

Rightly so ‘In-house counsel, the game changer’ was the theme at this year’s 21st ACLA conference from Australia’s Gold Coast. The three-day conference saw over 300 general counsels, in-house legal teams and legal officers explore new ideas, share learning, develop new skills, and take time to focus on the bigger picture as the legal landscape continues to evolve.

There was a wide variety of discussion across the various sessions, however below I have shared some of the key topics and insights from the conference.

What The CEO Hears – Translating Legal to Business

The overall feeling was that it’s not enough for today’s GCs to only offer legal advice. Now they need to be advisors on key commercial decisions. CEOs are asking their GCs to focus on the “so what?” rather than the “what” and asking for their judgment. For these reasons, having a positive relationship between the GC and CEO is critical.

In-house Counsel as Game Changers

This point follows on from the above in as much as, there is growing importance for legal professionals to have a seat at the table. They need be involved in the strategy, not just legal advice of their organizations. This will help them become business enablers not business blockers.

Another point raised was legal teams need to be engaged with the business much early in the process. It was felt that by bringing them into the project sooner, it  would drive business efficiency and avoid situations where they have said “no” further down the road.

Looking for more value for the business is also becoming part of the in-house role. Whether it’s reviewing panel firms and fee structures such as fixed fees or value based billing, or exploring new delivery models such as alternative models including legal outsourcers, it’s all up for consideration.

Innovation from In-house Teams

Legal outsourcing is changing the game too and now is considered a key element in implementing alternate delivery models. This approach will help legal departments ‘do more with less’ and ultimately reduce costs and increase efficiencies. Something we have been talking about to our clients.

Contract Management and Contract Lifecycle Management (CLM) systems are becoming an important focus to identify, manage and monitor risk. Finally, just like any other organization, we saw conversations about, how to make the business more effective and run cheaper. The conversations explored bringing more work in-house, utilizing contract management technology and outsourcing.

Read more about our Exigent game changer