Leading Law Departments: What GCs Care About -- Or Not?

In a piece titled, rather grandly, “Strategic Priorities: A data-driven resolution for corporate law departments,” Elizabeth Duffy, senior director of global client services with Thomson Reuters, announces a new blog that looks at metrics corporate law departments can use to align their strategic priorities with those of their companies. It’s normal at year’s end, Duffy writes, to reflect and set ambitious new goals for the year ahead and then watch them devolve into empty promises. “To counter this,” Duffy says, “experts recommend digging deep into the why for each goal you set in order to build a stronger commitment to it and enable a greater chance of reaching it. In the corporate world, strategic priorities set the stage for this kind of goal setting. So where are corporate law departments focusing this year?”

Turning to a TR survey of 400 law department leaders, here is where Duffy says law department leaders are focusing their attention and resources: efficiency in the conduct of their business (50%), protecting the organization from risk (46%), delivering legal work effectively (39%), and developing and retaining talent (14%).

Hard to argue with any of those, but let’s flip the numbers and see if we can shed some light on the huge number of law department leaders who apparently are not focusing on: operating efficiently (50%), safeguarding the business (54%), effectively delivering work (61%), and developing talent (86%). But wait. Maybe TR is ahead of us. Next up in the series: “Mind the gap! The mismatch between what corporate law departments are trying to achieve and what they are measuring.” Based on these numbers, that’s no gap. It’s a GRAND CANYON.

Check out "Strategic Priorities: A data-drive resolution for corporate law departments" HERE!