Using Business Intelligence In Law Firm To Track Diversity

There’s a new article on CIO’s website titled “How a Global Law Firm Used Business Intelligence to Fix Customer Billing Woes” that features how the global law firm Bryan Cave is using their billing data to track projects as part of their diversity efforts.  The article says:

Bryan Cave partners use business intelligence tools from Redwood Analytics as well as tools constructed in-house using Microsoft’s OLAP tools (SQL Server, Analysis Services, Reporting Services) to forecast what effect various pricing and staffing decisions will have on a project.

The tools also allow lawyers to track budgets in real time so they can quickly make adjustments. The BI tools even provide a diversity dashboard, which tracks the hourly mix of women and minorities working on the firm’s cases, a feature the company will license to Redwood Analytics for sale to other law firms, Alber says. The firm developed this diversity tool to bring transparency to the diversity reporting process required by many clients, says Alber.

In an age of transparency for clients, this is a great development.  This way, law firms will have hardcopy proof of their diversity successes/failures.  Also, reporting by the women and minorities that do the work will not only be anecdotal, but there will be hard figures to back their perspectives of whether they are getting equal treatment.

Programs helping lawyers return to work

New York Times has a helpful article about a few programs that help women and men who take time off from the law to return to the workplace. The article mentions a few programs, such as the one at Pace University Law School in White Plains:

The program, which cost $4,500, is a week of classes from 9 to 5; part-time classes for 10 weeks; and a 150-hour unpaid internship. There were 12 women and one man.

The ABA and Hastings College of the Law in San Francisco also run courses for returning lawyers. I think this sounds great. I would also hope that law firms will develop open door policies that allow former employees to return after a hiatus. That too will help both the men and women with small children as well as the hiring/retention costs of the law firm. Win-win situations, right?

Billable Hours — Bad for clients?

The blogosphere has been abuzz with the results of a survey done by a group called “Law Students Building A Better Legal Profession.  Here is the group’s blog describing it as “a national grassroots movement of law students committed to improving the quality of life at large private law firms.”  There are breakdowns of the demographics of large firms in various US cities.

What caught my eye today was a blog entry about the “Costs to the Profession,” specifically, to clients, firms, attorneys and their communities.   I agree with what they say about working long hours… I mean, I can see how working long hours occasionally on a file where there is a time deadline or a big task, but to regularly work those long hours…do you want to be the client who pays for sloppy work that was done in the last hour of a 14 hour work day?

What happens if you get a law degree but don’t “use” it?

I’m surfing for articles today and I came across a Burbank Leader article about an event honoring women in business.  Susan Westerberg Prager was the featured speaker.  Here is the part of the article that caught my eye:

When Prager, a former attorney, first considered law school, an undergraduate peer of hers at Stanford University cautioned, “Why would you want to take up a man’s place in law school? You will never use the degree.”

That got me thinking.  If a women goes to law school and gets her degree then marries someone who makes enough money to support the family and decides to stay home, some would say that she “wasted” her degree.  I don’t see it that way. I think that Education is never wasted.  Whether it’s a law degree, fine arts, philosophy… anything that requires skill and brains, it’s never wasted even if you decide to take your life in a different direction.

Get on board with Mary Cranston

I like the ABA newsletters which provides highlights of people’s accomplishments, news, and practice tips.  In the September issue, there is an interesting Q&A with Mary Cranston, who sits on the board at VISA.  She talks about the traits that help make women lawyers contributing members of corporate boards.

The DirectWomen Institute is an ABA program to develop and train accomplished women to become directors on boards.  Now that sounds like a great idea for networking.