Ari Kaplan recently spoke to Anne Post, the CEO of Xakia Technologies’ North America division. Xakia Technologies is a provider of legal matter and contract management solutions.
They discussed how law department leaders should approach technology adoption to maximize impact and efficiency, the biggest challenges that in-house legal teams face in demonstrating value, and the most compelling opportunities for legal departments to become true strategic partners within their organizations.
Ari Kaplan: Tell us about your background and your role at Xakia.
Anne Post: I was a practicing lawyer for about 20-plus years and moved to Xakia, an Australian-based company with global operations, in 2017, when we were just launching in North America. I always joke that I’ve worn about every hat over here, except I’m not a developer and have grown into the role of managing our team in North America.
Ari Kaplan: How should legal department leaders approach technology adoption to maximize both the impact and efficiency?
Anne Post is the CEO of Xakia Technologies’ North America division. Xakia Technologies is a provider of legal matter and contract management solutions.
Anne Post: One of the things I love about what I do is problem-solving with teams, and we often recommend defining the problem before you tackle projects and not only understanding the why and the pain points that you’re trying to solve but also communicating that why properly to your team. Things have improved over the years, but I initially encountered many situations where technology decisions were imposed on teams. Now, there’s a better process of engaging stakeholders, whether they’re your own legal team or whether they’re from the business, to understand why you’re planning to use a particular tool, the pain points you’re trying to address, and progressing it from there. Once you’ve defined the problem that you want to solve, don’t focus exclusively on that problem. Think bigger picture and longer term. You might be looking for a contract management tool, but where are you going to be in 12 or 24 months? Will you soon be trying to solve spending? Do you have a core matter management problem that you need to solve? If so, look for a tool that can scale with you. Otherwise, you will be plugging systems together and be back in the same position in 12 months, looking for an additional tool.
Ari Kaplan: What are the biggest challenges that in-house legal teams face in demonstrating value to the business?
Anne Post: Everyone knows that the legal department is important, but the business doesn’t always necessarily understand what it does, so legal is constantly fighting that tension between being that cost center and wanting to demonstrate that the work it is doing is really important and showing how it is moving the initiatives of the organization forward. One of the biggest challenges is the lack of metrics and benchmarking. Many teams don’t start with data because using data as a starting point is a challenge. Legal is naturally used to speaking in beautiful words, but the rest of the business speaks in data. As a result, getting onto an equal playing field so legal speaks the language of the rest of the business is crucial. Telling the story of what they do through benchmarking, data visibility and systems is one of the biggest challenges for legal. Surfacing information through reporting is essential for telling that story. Then it is key to align what legal is doing to achieve the overall goals of the business.
Ari Kaplan: Where do you see opportunities for legal departments to become true strategic partners with their organizations?
Anne Post: Properly using data and reporting are hallmarks of successful legal teams, who aggregate information to tell compelling stories to different stakeholders within the business around how legal is providing services, what they’re doing proactively, and how they serve as a strategic partner. Data moves them out of a traditional reactive position into one of a more proactive partner.
Ari Kaplan: What have you found typically gets in the way of being a high-performance in-house legal team?
Anne Post: Resource constraints are often a problem for legal teams. A constant challenge for them is being under-resourced. Many lack the people and the budgets they need, so those are two that I would focus on.
Ari Kaplan: How do you see the relationship between legal and other business units changing in the next few years?
Anne Post: We are already seeing the momentum increase because thinking about that old model of legal being traditionally the department of “no” is a cliche now. The new model is that legal is more embedded in the organization. There are improved processes to work with the business units. Legal is moving faster and in smarter ways. There’s more self-service and more automation, which will only accelerate and expand in the coming years with AI.
Ari Kaplan: What different skills do in-house lawyers and professionals that support the legal team need in order to adapt in this way?
Anne Post: Curiosity, innovation, an innovative mindset and a willingness to modernize. Legal is comprised of traditional thinkers. They move more slowly. They’re risk averse. There’s a real reluctance to innovate because no one wants to make a mistake, as mistakes from legal have consequences. The most successful teams with technology adoption are the ones that are leadership-driven, with the general counsel or chief legal officer encouraging process improvements. The expectations from above drive expectations throughout the team, which often results in successful outcomes.
Ari Kaplan: What are some best practices that general counsel should follow when modernizing their teams?
Anne Post: One of the biggest hurdles for legal teams is that they strive for perfection, which is elusive when introducing new technology and iteratively driving progress. I advise teams not to get stymied by analysis paralysis. Just get started. The technology will move and grow with you. You can make changes. Don’t go into a project expecting perfection from the start because you will want to make changes as soon as you start seeing how it functions for your team. The best practice is to just get started with something because during that lag of overthinking and delayed decision-making, you will lose time, when you could be seeing almost instant improvements.
Ari Kaplan: How can general counsel secure buy-in for new technology shifts and processes that will elevate the ability of the business to work smarter?
Anne Post: Be proactive in how you engage with the business. General counsel who move more aggressively into a strategic partner role proactively provide information to the business, gather feedback and then fuel growth based on the feedback, engagement and collaboration with the business. We see the greatest success from engaging the stakeholders and improving the decision-making process. Get feedback, identify pain points and prioritize them.
Ari Kaplan: How do you see the corporate legal department evolving in an AI era?
Anne Post: Technology enables corporate legal departments to become more efficient and concentrate their services on the most strategic and complex tasks. Being able to identify the highest-priority items and effectively utilize AI as it advances and genuinely addresses productivity issues will help them succeed. They are also likely to delegate some control to their business units by providing more self-service options through templates and document automation, allowing legal to provide more strategic guidance and better align with business goals.
Listen to the complete interview at Reinventing Professionals.
Ari Kaplan regularly interviews leaders in the legal industry and in the broader professional services community to share perspective, highlight transformative change and introduce new technology at his blog and on Apple Podcasts.
This column reflects the opinions of the author and not necessarily the views of the ABA Journal—or the American Bar Association.
