Page 24 - CCCA Magazine. Winter 2018

{ FeatUre }

SHAWnA-leIGH MoUlTon AndreA AllISTon
director, Governance and legal operations, Partner, Knowledge Management, Stikeman elliott
Siemens Canada
“You have to be prepared to do something with the ideas
“When lawyers see problems, they want immediate solu- generated through a design thinking session. When we frst
tions. How did the problem arise? Can we fx the problem at started using it as an approach, we did not really appreci-
the forefront? Lawyers tend to always want a perfect solution ate how overwhelming it would be to review the new ideas
too. In legal design, you learn that solutions can evolve and and determine next steps.”
change to suit other scenarios.”

HoW to Have a successfuL LegaL Design WorksHop “For example, there are service design tools very relevant to the
legal department,” says Moon. “First, there are journey maps
Legal design thinking may be a popular idea in the legal innova- and system maps. These are tools themselves that apply to a
tion world but it’s not a new concept. Caitlin “Cat” Moon has been context of how work happens in map structure. Generally, map-
focused on human-centred design thinking for the past 12 years. ping journeys, systems and workfows can improve effciency
After starting a small practice with two other lawyers, she and response times and increase client satisfaction. The journey
and her partners used human-centred design thinking to cre- creation process with the client is incredibly good at eliminat-
ate an agile work environment. Moon has shifted from private ing waste and ineffciencies. Stakeholders can look at what their
practice to teaching law students about legal design and innova- interests are and see how it weaves through the system.”
tion at the Vanderbilt Law School. Perhaps the most critical step in hosting a workshop is get-
“Human-centred design is optimistic,” says Moon, Director ting lawyers to participate. Legal design thinking requires peo-
of Innovation Design for the Program in Law and Innovation. ple to be more creative and not rely on the traditional problem-
“In-house counsel are the superheroes that we need to change solving methods used in the practice of law. Moon says the key
the profession. This is a human change management challenge. is to make the workshop useful and relevant.
We’re building a culture around these mindsets and we need “How do you bring people along?” asks Moon. “First you
to embrace this change. Human-centred design is part of our have to start with self-awareness: have them recognize clearly
innovation process and we must embrace it to move our profes- who they are and what biases and preferences they have. Most
sion forward.” people won’t reject you if you take the right approach. You need
To become superheroes, you’ll need to assemble a team and to fgure out why they’re doing it and provide value to create a
plan a legal design workshop. The frst step is to determine what new process. A lot of that requires curiosity and design.”
goals you want to achieve and what value that will bring to the Siemens Canada is the perfect case study in executing a legal
people in the organization. design workshop. The legal operations team worked together
“You have to understand what the purpose is,” she says. to understand human-centred legal design thinking and picked
“Human-centred legal design is really a change management issue. process management as the topic because it was a sore point for
For example, I was speaking to the German division of a global cor- many lawyers and support staff. One of the lawyers on the team
porate legal department. The whole company was going lean and also completed a secondment with Stikeman Elliott to learn
agile for better effciency, and legal had to be embedded in multi- about knowledge management and legal design thinking. As a
disciplinary groups. So the purpose was to create a lean and agile result of the overwhelming success, Moulton and her team are
legal team. They were the last group that had to make the change going through the more than 150 ideas to fgure out what to
and they had no choice. The lawyers were described as chickens: implement and determine the next issue to tackle.
they sit there and lay eggs but they have to come out of their cages. “Once you start collecting information you have to think
It’s not a bad term—they lay great eggs—but now there had to be a about where you are going to store it,” says Moulton. “Our busi-
switch. Our work was to help them manage this change.” ness will keep growing but our legal team will not. We strive to
Before any system can be fxed, you have to fgure out what’s be the best business partner we can and effciently serve our cli-
broken. A thorough analysis of the current systems will help ents. We know there’s legal technology out there that could make
to determine what needs to be redesigned and expose some us more effcient but typically it’s too expensive for us. How do
pressure points. you convince the business you support to make that investment?

24 CCCA MAGAzInE | WInTER 2018 HIVER