The Benefits of Legal Request: A Customer Perspective

As a legal department administrator, I experience first-hand many of the challenges faced by corporate law departments across the country. My department team members and I receive numerous requests for legal work, and we work on hundreds of matters across various locations. We are always looking for ways to save time, simplify processes, and improve communications.

Recently, Eaton Corporation had the opportunity to test legal request – the newest feature from CounselLink^®. We were looking for a way to manage and track matters and other legal services requests from outside of the department without utilizing time-consuming practices like sending spreadsheets back and forth or creating paper forms. We needed better control and the ability to simplify the service request intake process.

Utilizing legal request also seemed like a solution to better manage costs, particularly when they originated from external business partners. There is sometimes an overlap in the use of law firms, as there are multiple departments within the company working with outside counsel. We needed a tool that would provide complete visibility on legal spend across the entire organization. For example, are the hourly rates and charges consistent for the same or similar work when multiple departments are using the same outside counsel? This is the type of information that corporations are looking for from their legal departments, and legal request provides the insights needed to manage and report this data. It’s a great tool.

Another key benefit is the ability to customize fields to fit the individual needs of our organization. We can set up and configure workflows and make it do what we need it to do – all without changing the user-friendly interface. It was easy to set up, and I was able to do so quickly.

Legal request is just the tool that we need. We can now provide uniform and consistent reporting across each of our offices. We have a better view of all our matters and work requests, and we can offer accurate, real-time data. With Legal request, our legal department has the power to evaluate and analyze our workload, relationships with outside counsel, invoicing, and workflows, helping us to be more efficient.

I would recommend legal request to other CounselLink customers because, if you are like us, your mailboxes are full and paper is everywhere. Legal request made it easy to include matters from outside the department while reducing the manual effort in getting that information. Everything is in one centralized location. You don’t have to transfer data or type it in, saving time and eliminating duplicate or wrong information. It is fabulous, and we look forward to continuing using legal request.

Author:

Micole Beachler, Legal Department Administrator, Eaton Corporation

Micole Beachler is the CounselLink Administrator for Eaton Corporation. She has been with the Eaton Law Department for 5 years. During this time, she has expanded the use and value of CounselLink throughout the department by streamlining processes, outside counsel management, and reporting.