How To Start Automation? Checklist Of Actions

In 2016, the business world was shocked by the story of a Californian start-up tester. After automating his daily tasks, he did his own thing during work hours instead of working and still regularly received a salary. He spent the first eight months on software tests, and then for the next six years he didn’t work. Many people doubt whether this anonymous story is true, but it shows how automation can be significant and useful for a company if it is used in the right way, to help employees with their tasks.

One of the most prominent examples of automation today is Amazon. In March 2012 (seven years ago!), Amazon bought the company Kiva Systems, which was developing mobile robotization to automate the work of transporting orders in its warehouses. This technology has saved the company $800 million in operating expenses.

Also, an investment bank study, Investec, found that in 2018 about $1 billion was invested in legal technology and related NewLaw companies. Lawyers want to optimize their work processes, especially when the solution lies on the surface. In recent years, more and more legal departments are introducing automation tools into their daily work routines. There are no more legal departments that don’t use any software for automation (at least such solution as MS Office). Lots of technological tools allow the implementation of partial or complex automation of legal and operational processes. Therefore, automation can be considered as the key to the integration with existing systems or transfer of all processes to a new unified system. So, how can you approach automation in order not to make mistakes?

Here is a checklist to help you start and test automation in your legal department.

1. Automation Goals

Time, money and human — these are the main resources and assets that can be saved by automation. For instance, there are up to ten lawyers in small legal departments and mostly they automate contractual work, according to a report from PwC and Legal Insight. On the other hand, middle departments, up to 50 lawyers, automate claim work. At the same time, most large departments also automate the department’s task management process. McKinsey recently estimated that 22% of a lawyer’s job and 35% of a law clerk’s job could be automated. For automation, legal departments most often use chatbots, a unified electronic document management system, e-Billing, E-Invoicing. More about legal solutions, which could optimize the company’s work — read in the article.

In order to determine what kind of automation you need, make a list of your company’s or legal department’s problems and determine which ones you will automate first. Look at tasks you and your staff don’t like doing or things that you do repetitively. Also, look at things that take a lot of time and figuring out how to automate them. Then determine their sequence and priorities. Clear objectives will help you choose the right technological solution. These objectives also will help you to convince your management to implement automation.

Often, the obstacle to implementing an automation system are the decision-makers in a company. This may be the GC, a senior lawyer, head of a department, or even a n operations manager in a company. The main reasons for lack of automation are myths; that automation is expensive and doubts about the effectiveness of its benefits. Even if projects look difficult, with the help of technology, you will see the positive result of changing processes sooner rather than later. You should convince your management to take a course on automation. Be sure that the results won’t be long in coming.

2. Automation Tool Experts

After the decision on automation has been made and goals have been set, the most crucial stage begins implementation. And the right people will be your support. 76% of companies attract external providers to automate their legal processes. The basic people whom you should find are an automation architect and automation engineers.

1. An automation architect is a person who is usually responsible for building automation frameworks. The automation architect must be able to interface effectively with both technologists and heads of departments and shepherd the project until the completion of the tech-solution implementation. Automation architects also have experience in different kinds of tools, and they usually know the strengths and weaknesses of each one. Automation architects have a role similar to a project manager, but with the necessary tech background.

2. Automation engineers will work under an automation architect and will be responsible for creating and executing scripts. The best combination for most projects is one automation architect and two automation engineers.

It is also important to understand that these people should be replaceable. After all, if you need to change the contractor, you should continue the process of the development — but not start it from scratch. The same idea applies to support at the end of the project.

3. Strategy and Deadlines

Before automation, you should conduct an internal audit of legal processes that you plan to automate. To do this, you need to discuss the plan with the lawyers who are responsible for the pieces of work you plan to automate. No one knows the internal processes better than that team of lawyers in your department. After you make an audit and have determined the goals of automation, you should create a strategy of step by step actions and set deadlines for the project.

You should then create a project group, which includes the person who oversees the automation process and the focus group of employees from the relevant legal department. This group will be responsible for compliance with deadlines, will coordinate the work of all the company’s employees involved in the project, and will also communicate with the technical team.

4. Testing

Start with small, efficient tests and build your infrastructure slowly so you can keep it well maintained. Here are a few things you can do in the testing phase:

1. Make sure your developers create detailed script logs. That way, if something goes wrong, debugging will be easier.

2. In the early stages of work an automated product, bugs are inevitable. Therefore, it is important how quickly you are able to eliminate them. Have a quick and efficient process in place to handle errors in your automation flow. Who gets notified about bugs by email or SMS immediately? How is it handled and within what time frame? Who is responsible for managing those errors? Your technical team or a hired tester may be responsible for this. Make sure you discuss this at the start of technical development.

3. Make sure your developers can access and debug the testing environment at any time if necessary. If their access is limited, they can’t help you when an error occurs.

4. Get the team of employees from your legal department involved in the process of testing. Keeping any knowledge in the hands of just one expert is risky. You do need someone who will keep automation moving toward clearly defined goals, but everyone else in your company or legal department should also be involved. Spend some resources and let the team try different things until they finally come up with a winning automation strategy. Teamwork is vital to this process working effectively.

At the stage when your team is confident that the product is ready for use, but you can still make adjustments, let a focus group of your users test the product. It may be the lawyers who will end up working with it. Ask their opinion about what works for them, what they do not like, and what they would like to improve upon. You will need their constructive criticism.

5. Debugging and Scaling

Even having tested everything more than once and in different focus groups, something might not work with the final product. Don’t be afraid to deviate from the plan and act quickly to reach better product performance. Creating the perfect solution the first time may be difficult, but it will be much easier if the whole process is provided by a legal tech company that specializes in complex legal work automation.

Conclusion

Automation opens up new opportunities for people and companies, increases capital, and speeds up processes. Those who refuse to accept it simply don’t give themselves the ability to live a more efficient life with more opportunities. Despite the general speed of progress, on a global scale, humanity is only beginning to use automation at full power, especially in the legal sphere. Who knows, maybe this story can still be revised or written by you. If you have such a vision, use it to make work and life better.