How to solve legal cases with Smartsheet
Ever since I started using Smartsheet, it has been a time and energy saver for me! To admit, at the beginning I haven’t received any training on Smartsheet. I discovered all the tools and functionalities myself and it was much easier than any other software available for lawyers!
6 years ago, I started working as a Legal Campaigner within the Climate and Energy Team of GP Med. At the same time, I was supporting the Programs Department on legal matters. I must admit Smartsheet is life saving for me since I’m working on several projects with several legal documents wearing my two hats; a lawyer and a campaigner. Having the opportunity to view all my work in one sheet has saved me a lot of time and improved my efficiency dramatically. Timing is everything to win legal cases. There are critical moments that you can’t miss in every single case. Reminders are my best friends during those moments. They are super easy to set and very efficient.
I would like to give an example without going too much into the details for obvious reasons! Gantt view shows all your work, including law cases. As part of our coal campaign, we sometimes receive 20 different law cases for one single coal power plant. 20 cases mean 20 separate folders with all the documentation stored. You need to follow 20 cases, with all the dates and all the documents. To make the best planning, I need a good calendar and need to be notified of the exact dates. Smartsheet does all of it for me. I just need to set up the system and keep the information updated.
I recently started using alerts and notifications. Being able to see all the documents and the Project in one sheet is magical. I no more need my own folders, I can see my work anytime, anywhere. For lawyers, there are special softwares but they are not user-friendly and expensive. Smartsheet does everything they do and on top of it, it is much easier.
Sometimes we are eager to delay some certain tasks. Campaigners, just like lawyers, focus on many elements of a project. While trying to avoid some certain tasks, you finish many others. This usually happens to people who are working on multiple projects and actually happens quite often. If you are working on multiple projects like in campaigns; which is a multi-discipline area, you tend to see the documents horizontally, laid on a flat surface. This is the case at my office desk and my home! In order to see all the documents and keep track of them, I use a horizontal view. Smartsheet allows me to work on all the documents in one window, one workspace rather than laying all the folders on my desk.
If we take the usage of Smartsheet one step further, I would like to use it more for collaboration. If all the lawyers that have climate litigation cases globally share the developments in the cases and everybody sees that, that increases collaboration dramatically. Smartsheet is a live instrument. The more data you enter, better you can track the progress. If we use it more efficiently with the idea of global collaboration, we also start creating our own “Artificial Intelligence”. Using such tools such Smartsheet turns the data required into an institutional memory since it is also very easy to archive documents.
Deniz Bayram,
Head of Campaigns, GP MED
