A lot can happen in two weeks. Due to a number of positive and negative work-related and personal challenges, I've not posted for a couple weeks. In 2009, that wouldn't have been an issue. There just was not a great deal of news and analysis of legal project management on a month-to-month basis. If January is any indication, however, 2010 looks to be a much more exciting year for those interested in the subject.
I was put back into a writing mood this past Friday as I started reading Stephen Levy's book, Legal Project Management, on the high speed rail from Taipei to Taichung.[1] I'd given up waiting for the Amazon Kindle version and broke down and laid out the cash for international shipping for the hard copy. Both the wait and the extra cost were well worth it. The HSR from Taipei to Taichung is only an hour trip, but in that hour I marked up the first few chapters with points that excited me and statements that I may want to challenge. Steven's book will generate enough material to keep me posting for months.
Serendipitously, I also recently stumbled across an article on Legal Project Management published way back in May, 2005, by Roger Quick (currently a Partner at DLA Phillips Fox) in the International Lawyers Network's Bullet"iln" newsletter.[2] I hope to write a short review of his article in the next week or so.
That is if I can keep on top of all the material generated in the blawgosphere. I do not intend to cover every post on every blog in depth, but I thought I'd share some of the past two week's LPM highlights.
- Jim Hassett completed his three part series on project management and alternative fees on his Legal Business Development blog.[3]
- Carla Landry, Greg Lambert, and Richard Stout exchange views on whether lawyers make good law firm project managers on their (or their employer's) respective blogs Hildebrandt, 3 Geeks and a Law Blog, and Lawdable.[4] This is a topic that I've had an interest in for some time and has been the topic of other posts.[5] I plan to discuss Landry's and Lambert's posts in more detail later this week.
- Joshua P. Kubicki, who describes himself as a legal process engineer uses GPS technology as an analogy to better understand Legal Project Management in his blog Legal Transformation. This blog is a new discovery for me and I'm looking forward to reading more of Mr. Kubicki's insights in the future.[6]
- Rees Morrison emphasizes the importance of checklists on his Law Department Management blog. This is a topic dear to my heart and I hope to share my thoughts on checklist this or next week (I know how exciting this must be to you and how difficult the wait will be, but please be patient.)[7]
- Erika Santiago discusses the importance of managing expectations on e-discovery projects in a post to her Electronic Discovery Project Manager blog.[8]
- Veteran e-discovery project managers Scott Gillard and Michael So of e-law Asia discuss the nature of e-discovery work and e-discovery market trends in Asia, in a Posse List interview.[9]
- Mazy Hedayat introduces Tom's Planner, a Web app for making GANTT charts, on his blogs The Illinois Bankruptcy Lawyer Blog and Practice Hacker.[10]
- Finally, in another interview on The Posse List, Ron Friedman, Senior Vice President of Marketing for Integreon, reminds us that firms must get serious about project management. He also discusses early case assessment and predictive coding and points out that this technology does not pose a man versus machine scenario.
[R]ather, it's how do we integrate the two in a cost-effective process that holds up both to judicial and statistical scrutiny . . . the biggest challenge and opportunity is creating a consistent, reproducible, documented, and defensible approach that integrates the best of technology and standard processes. The challenge is not who has the best algorithm, the best software, or the best reviewers. Rather, the challenge is putting algorithm, software, and reviewer together into an economically affordable, statistically sound, and judicially defensible process. And that must be done in a consistent, repeatable, industrially controlled process. Think workflows, documentation, training, metrics, formal quality control, feedback loops, sampling, etc.
[11]
[1] Steven Levy, Legal Project Management: Control Costs, Meet Schedules, Manage Risks, and Maintain Sanity (2009).
[2] Roger Quick & Philip Reed, Legal Project Management, Bullet"iln" (International Lawyers Network), May. 27, 2005, http://www.imakenews.com/iln/e_article000394800.cfm?x=b11,0,w (last visited Jan. 31, 2010).
[3] Jim Hasset, Project Management and Alternative Fees (Part 3 of 3), Legal Business Development, Jan. 20, 2010, http://adverselling.typepad.com/how_law_firms_sell/2010/01/project-management-and-alternative-fees-part-3-of-3.html (Jan. 31, 2010).
[4] Carla Landry, Is It Possible to Turn Lawyers Into Project Managers?...Or Will They Crash and Burn?, Hildebrandt, Jan. 20, 2009, http://www.hildebrandt.com/blog/archive/2010/01/20/is-it-possible-to-turn-lawyers-into-project-managers-or-will-they-crash-and-burn.aspx (last visited Jan. 31, 2009); Greg Lambert, Law Firm Project Managers - Lawyer or Non-Lawyer?, 3 Geeks and a Law Blog, Jan. 21, 2009, http://www.geeklawblog.com/search/label/project%20management (last visited Jan. 31, 2009); Richard Stout, The Spotlight Shines on Project Management, Lawdable, Jan. 21, 2010, http://www.lawdable.com/2010/01/articles/litigation-support/the-spotlight-shines-on-project-management/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed:+Lawdable+(Lawdable) (last visited on Jan. 31, 2010).
[5] E.g., Paul C. Easton, The Lawyerification of Litigation Support: Is a Legal Education a Benefit or Just Baggage for an E-discovery Project Manager?, Legal Project Management, Sep. 25, 2009, http://legalprojectmanagement.info/2009/09/the-lawyerification-of-litigation-support-is-a-legal-education-a-benefit-or-just-baggage-for-an-e-di.html#ixzz0e8Va3mcz (last visited Jan. 31, 2009).
[6] Joshua P. Kubicki, Legal Project Management as your GPS (a Basic Overview), Legal Transformation: The Changing Legal Profession, Jan. 25, 2010, http://joshuakubicki.blogspot.com/2010/01/legal-project-management-as-your-gps.html (last visited Jan. 31, 2010).
[7] Rees Morrison, Checklists, practical tools with enormous (under-used) benefit for lawyers, Law Department Management, Jan. 26, 2009, http://www.lawdepartmentmanagementblog.com/law_department_management/2010/01/checklists-practical-tools-with-enormous-under-used-benefit-for-lawyers.html (last visited Jan. 31, 2009)..
[8] Erika Santiago, Explaining E-Discovery To Your Friends & Family, Electronic Discovery Project Manager, Jan. 27, 2009, http://ediscoverypm.wordpress.com/2010/01/27/explaining-e-discovery-to-your-friends-family/ (last visited Jan. 31, 2010).
[9] Mr. Posse, An interview with Scott Gillard and Michael So of e.law Asia Pacific; the spike in e-discovery work in Asia, The Posse List, Jan. 28, 2010, http://www.theposselist.com/2010/01/28/an-interview-with-scott-gillard-and-michael-so-of-e-law-asia-pacific-the-spike-in-e-discovery-work-in-asia/ (last visited Jan. 31, 2010).
[10] Mazy Hedayat, Mashable! Tom's Planner (Web-Based Project Management), The Illinois Bankruptcy Lawyer Blog, Jan. 29, 2010, http://illinoisbankruptcylawyerblog.com/2010/01/29/mashable-toms-planner-web-based-project-management/ (last visited Jan. 31, 2010); Mazy Hedayat, Mashable! Tom's Planner (Web-Based Project Management), Practice Hacker, Jan. 29, 2010, http://www.practicehacker.com/2010/01/29/mashable-toms-planner-web-based-project-management/ (last visited Jan. 31, 2010)
[11] Mr. Posse, An interview with Ron Friedmann of Integreon; the legal paradigm shift, predictive coding, document categorization, and more, The Posse List, Jan. 29, 2010, http://www.theposselist.com/2010/01/29/an-interview-with-ron-friedmann-of-integreon-the-legal-paradigm-shift-predictive-coding-document-categorization-and-more/ (last visited Jan. 31, 2010).
My apologies that the Kindle version seems to be caught up in the grinder somewhere. I look forward to discussing various approaches to Legal Project Management in the future.
-- Steven B. Levy
Author, Legal Project Management: Control Costs, Meet Schedules, Manage Risks, and Maintain Sanity
Paul,
Thanks for the plug. I look forward to further writing on this topic and hope to learn as much, if not more, as I share. I agree there is a lot of "buzz" around LPM right now. For my part I am trying to seize on this as an opportunity to advance the importance of this function/role within organizations while there is attention on it. Further, as organizations become for focused on the convergence of processes within the information/knowledge, human capital/SME, and technology spaces I believe the business case for adding PM will gain in strength. As to Legal PM it follows that to the extent an organization already has an active legal group that LPM would be a natural extension. As to traditional law firms - the jury is out on whether they will see the need and if so - provide the solution themselves or hire out - as you touch on in "Law Firms Who Get It" http://ow.ly/12aPI. I look to help make the case either way.
As to Steve's book - I too was hoping for Kindle version but alas I have hard copy being shipped as we speak.
Thanks,
Joshua