The Basics of Legal Project Management
As the legal industry becomes increasingly competitive and clients demand more transparency and efficiency from their service providers, innovative approaches to legal delivery continuing to gain traction. One such approach is the implementation of Legal Project Management (LPM). For many firms, it offers a way to standardize approach to planning, executing and monitoring engagements, and provides the means to proactively control scope, schedule and budget.
Unfortunately, however, there is no standardized way to define exactly what you mean by LPM. At its most basic level, project management entails identifying a process with a defined initiation, planning, execution and closure, and putting the wheels in motion to get the project across the finish line.
So, what exactly is LPM?
Though not yet mainstream, LPM is gaining support across the board. As noted by Carolyn Elefant at Above The Law, the realistic timeline for mass adoption is 7-10 years, but Elefant also argues that those firms who proactively embrace LPM will be at a distinct competitive advantage.
The ABA defines LPM as "a professional discipline concerned with the planning and controlling of an adequate and appropriate resource allocation to deliver upon a matter in a cost-effective manner."
While there are some who argue that LPM is just common sense practiced only by a handful of lawyers and firms, or that it is simply legalese for budget and time estimates, others view it as a business imperative. For many firms, however, like most aspects of the legal business, there are shades of grey. LPM falls somewhere in between common sense and budget and time estimates .
In short, LPM is an organized and more formalized way to manage the business of client work. There are many standards available for the formalized processes involved with LPM. And the concept is not a new one—project management has been used effectively in industries such as construction, software development, manufacturing, healthcare, and telecommunications for decades. From a business perspective, however, the idea of LPM is still relatively new to the legal industry and LPM training is still somewhat uncommon.
One of the biggest hurdles faced in getting started with LPM is the prevailing culture shift from within. Many attorneys resent the fact that they aren’t being credited for hard work, and view LPM as an unnecessary reporting hoop to jump through. Others are forced to conform to a management approach that they do not believe in or understand, which has imploded into confusion and chaos. As with most things, the client is the biggest driver—the demand for client satisfaction means firms will need to find better, more efficient ways to meet demands.
LPM is about maximizing value for the client while reducing costs and delivering the level of service required by the client, while meeting firm profitability targets. A collaborative approach is necessary to educate both clients and lawyers on what works best for both parties. This approach entails regular communication to establish a strategy, define goals and objectives and document all communications. As we’ve pointed out previously, E-discovery resources are also now incorporating LPM into their billing and client engagement correspondence.
The Value of Certification in Legal Project Management
In addition to a higher level of knowledge, there are numerous and significant advantages to obtaining certification in legal project management.
Many leadership roles insist on or at least prefer project management certification for various benefits it provides. The Association for Project Management includes project management certifications as one of the most common pre-requisites for promotion to management and director-level positions. Here are some of the top benefits of getting certified: Better Equipped to Meet Client Needs During these volatile times in the economy — Strategic investments and good value for money are essential to win and retain business. Some argue that project management, instead of raising client expectations, is actually about meeting them, and is critical to delivering on proposals, setting budgets and executing within the planned time. Professional project management expert Susan Mazur-Stommen conducted an extensive study of clients and their attorneys in "Does Law Really Speak the Language of Business?". Mazur-Stommen confirmed what many of us have personally experienced, that clients resent firms that continually exceed budgets to generate revenue – even if the value received is perceived superior. Lawyers who embrace project management get their work done on time, within budget, and deliver precisely the client expects, or perhaps a tad more, without overspending. Competitiveness Project management skills provide a competitive edge when combined with legal expertise, by harnessing the power of specific, repeatable systems and processes. Legal project management is about doing more with less. It provides a structured way to better manage resources and meet client and organizational expectations. Legal project management success is about process improvement and efficiency. One of the most surprising benefits of project management certification is the lift it can give your career. Having project management certification is a powerful add-on to your CV, and significantly enhances your job market appeal. The companies who employ certified project managers realize significant benefits that can directly affect your success. In fact, recent research by PricewaterhouseCooper highlights that organizations with standardized project management practices had better performance (in terms of KPIs) than those without such practices. In other words, organizations that do project management well are more successful. PwC further reports that companies with low project management maturity are 26 times more likely to fail than those with high maturity in xontrastf management. Will you be left behind by not performing project management well? Are you prepared to take advantage of this simple, but powerful, tool?
Selecting the Optimal Certification Program
Accreditation, curriculum, faculty expertise and cost all play a part in making a decision to embark on a legal project management certification program.
Accreditation is an important criterion for selecting a certification program. Accredited programs have been evaluated by a certifying body and can provide you with the peace of mind that your investment will be recognized by the industry standards. The two primary certifying bodies are the Project Management Institute (PMI) and the Global Association for Quality Management (GAQM). PMI is a larger organization with greater visibility. GAQM is a non-profit organization headquartered out of the US with members that include many Fortune 500 companies.
Most certification programs include the same core concepts and information, but how that information is presented may drive your decision. Consider the price of texts or other materials you may need to purchase as well as the availability of supplemental learning aids such as videos, webinars and practice tests. Practicing LPM professionals list their most common textbooks as: A Guide to the Project Management Body of Knowledge, Third Edition by the Project Management Institute (PMI), The Complete Project Management Office Handbook by Pritchett & Boehm, and The Art and Science of Project Management by Roger Warszynski. In addition, Certification by the Global Association for Quality management includes a textbook, Ultimate Guide to Project Management by Issa Abu Sayeed.
The faculty’s experience or expertise is important because it indicates the exposure they may have in ways to navigate the intricacies of the material. LPM trainers should continue to be practicing LPM professional or have intimate and significant professional experience, if the only experience they have with the topic is presenting. If there will be a mentoring program, you also want to ensure your mentor is someone who regularly uses LPM in the practice of law.
The cost of certification may be a concern, but consider the return on your investment. If your employer is party to the costs including the course fee, your time (billable or non-billable), the texts, etc, then make your decision based on accredited programs that fit your style. If you pay for this yourself, or if it is a combination of you and your employer, you will want to look at programs that provide the certification for a reasonable cost with value-added features such as continued support or mentoring.
Leading Certification Programs for Legal Project Management
Some of the most popular and respected legal project management certification programs include:
1. The Project Management Professional (PMP)® Certification by the Project Management Institute (PMI)
The PMP® certification is one of the most recognized project management certifications in the world. It is available for legal project managers who wish to enhance their credentials and establish their expertise in the field. The certification demonstrates proficiency in a proven set of project management practices, and requires test takers to have an understanding of the five process groups and nine knowledge areas as they relate to the project.
2. Association for Project Management (APM)
APM has several qualifications available to legal project managers at all levels of experience. They are modular and can be studied in any order. The qualifications are:
• Project Fundamentals Qualification: A foundation held by project staff, entry-level and anyone in a support role.
• Level 1 and 2 qualifications: Designed for professionals overseeing or managing smaller projects, where budget management is essential.
• Level 3 qualification: Speaks to professionals delivering specific and defined business goals.
3. Legal Project Management Certification by the International Institute of Legal Project Management (IILPM)
The IILPM certification is designed for legal project managers in a variety of settings to achieve verified recognition of their LPM capabilities. Candidates must pass a test and then commit to 20 hours of continuing education in the area to maintain their certification.
Prospects after Getting Certified
For those already entrenched in the legal world, upskilling with a legal project management certification can be your ticket to new and exciting career opportunities that may have seemed unattainable before. For example, for junior or mid-level lawyers, transitioning to a project manager role may be in your future. Senior lawyers looking for an alternative to the partnership track may also explore legal LPM roles. Additionally, in-house legal teams seeking to improve their efficiency and align with the project management best practices of the companies they serve , may seek to hire legal project managers or take advantage of the skills possessed by existing team members through LPM certifications. Alternatively, in-house corporate teams may look to their business partners for help with their value realization goals. Business teams may also look to their law firms as partners in value realization efforts in light of their expertise. Outside of the legal world, the legal project management certification may also help to differentiate you in the corporate world. Government roles may also be an option for LPM professionals. Some of these opportunities may also open doors to adjunct professor positions or speaking opportunities should you seek those paths.
Enhancing Skills with Legal Project Management
A critical component of a legal project management certification is the development of important competencies that extend the reach of a lawyer’s legal education. Such competencies include the following:
Strategic Planning
The most important element of legal project management is developing an effective strategic plan for each case. A competent legal project manager knows how to fact-check regular updates to the strategic plan as the case progresses, and he or she understands how to look for and respond to red flags that can indicate trouble in the case. The strategic plan not only gives lawyers a road map for solving their clients’ problems, but it also helps them look for ways to reduce costs and improve efficiency.
Risk Management
For lawyers to help their clients understand and accept the risks that exist in a case, they need to look for the red flags that indicate where the most significant risks lie. Like evaluating a medical diagnosis, it is essential for lawyers to be able to ask the right questions to get to the heart of the client’s concern—and to make sure that the final strategic plan addresses those concerns.
Communicating
Lawyers must communicate effectively to clients and case participants, budgeting and billing departments, law firm management, judges, and even risk managers and insurance underwriters. In a non-legal context, the legal project manager would refer to this as stakeholder communication.
Collaborating
Because they often work on complex matters with multiple partners across long periods of time, lawyers must coordinate their work with other lawyers at their firm, with opposing counsel, and even with judicial staff such as clerks and law firm risk management officers. Legal project managers must understand the project scope well enough to identify the tasks requiring coordination.
Success Stories: Case Studies
One of the best ways to understand the impact of any of these certifications is to review case studies or success stories. The following examples are the experiences of individuals who have benefitted from their course of study with tangible results.
A Success Story
"I knew I needed to become more efficient and have better processes to keep our firm profitable, and education on LPM was the way to do it," says Alexia Cox, law firm administrator at the Sacramento business law firm of Kahn, Soares & Conway, LLP, based in California. "Our team became a better project manager, and we put the systems in place based on what we learned. We now have documents that guide us in how to get from point A to point B more efficiently and profitably. Even if we aren’t always at the ideal number of hours for that project, we know why we are where we are."
Cox studied LPM through the West LegalEdcenter (now Thomson Reuters Webinars) Legal Project Management Certificate Program. "I enrolled a few staff on the project management side of the program as well," she says. "My biggest takeaway is to be aware of your time. If you say something is going to take a certain amount of time, then you need to be able to backup your statement. It used to be we would say a project will take 5 hours, and we wouldn’t think anything about it afterwards. Now we can see if we are on track or not."
The firm members who took the LPM courses were all leaders in their firm . "Before taking the course, we operated at entry-level project management skills, but after the course we felt very knowledgeable and powerful in strategizing and working on what we learned," Cox adds.
A Success Story
"My client was an insurance company, and we had a recent case that turned out to be one of our most profitable ever. It was due to many factors, but thanks to the systems we created because of LPM, it was done mostly because of us being very efficient," says Roberta Sutherland, partner at the Toronto law firm Papazian Heisey Myers P.C.
Sutherland studied LPM through the West LegalEdcenter (now Thomson Reuters Webinars) Legal Project Management Certificate Program, including modules on matter management, risk analysis, and critical path analysis. "The modules gave us the awareness we needed to move towards a more project based mindset and away from the traditional way of operating," she says.
"Most importantly, our senior lawyers learned to monitor the hours on a file. Our software system can automate work allocation, so that a law clerk will now have a 14 hour file, and the lawyer is alerted. When they were first brought in, they were responsible for 4 hours, but it spiraled out of control. Now, when an unexpected event occurs, such as a medical emergency, they have the systems and processes in place in order to mitigate the impact."
"Everyone tells us that we are way ahead of other firms. We’ve become leaders in LPM," Sutherland concludes.