Hi there,
I love a good story, don’t you?
Especially when it involves killing the billable hour 🤺 and getting old–school lawyers to admit that legal tech is a good thing. 👴 + 🤖 =🥇
😏
So… the hero of our story — a self-admitted old-school litigator (even older than me!) who was (no big surprise here), also a legal tech sceptic.
We’ll call him “Bob” to protect his identity. 🥸
Bob is the head of litigation at a Fortune 500 company.
He had a number of strong relationships with firms, many of which had developed into close personal connections over the years.
Their wives were friends. 🤝
They took vacations together. 🏖️
I might be embellishing here, but perhaps Bob may have been a god-parent to one or two of their kids. 👼
When a big matter needed the attention of an outside firm, Bob knew just who to call to take care of it.
And that’s exactly how his legal sourcing process had worked for 20+ years.
Until PERSUIT. 😬
When Bob’s GC and head of legal ops told him that the company was going to start using a new legal procurement platform that would require Bob’s team to scope out each matter into an RFP...
And then ask their law firms (i.e. his close personal friends!) to compete for the work…
Well, Bob was…irked 🤬 (as a former litigator, I know exactly what choice words probably came out of his mouth).
Fortunately, this is a story with a happy ending (and we all love a happy ending!).
I’m glad to say that Bob is now not only a friend — but a HUGE advocate — of PERSUIT.
Here’s what Bob recently shared with me about his experience. And his change of heart:
Using a competitive legal sourcing process to select outside firms challenged him to go from the easy and automatic (but not the most effective) behaviour of just picking up the phone, to…
✅ Really thinking about who he was going to instruct and why
✅ What outcome he was looking to achieve in the matter
✅ What questions he needed to ask to assess which firm was the best choice to deliver that particular outcome.
In short, Bob went from relying on trusted business — and personal — relationships, to…
Adopting a fair, transparent, and equitable process to selecting the right firm, the right team, and at the right price.
So going from an indefensible approach (and all the bias inherent in such an approach) to knowing you’ve made the right choice — something which most of the “Bobs” out there can’t readily admit if they’re being honest.
Interestingly, Bob also shared with me an unexpected benefit of embracing this new process — one he’s come to value even more than ensuring he’s getting the right price for a matter...
Insight into the different litigation strategies each of the firms was recommending — before choosing which firm to go with. 💡
(But that’s a story for another day and newsletter.)
For Bob, the process also had the counterintuitive effect of strengthening his personal relationships rather than degrading them.
When his firm friends came to him asking why they weren’t selected, PERSUIT’s fair and transparent process served as a buffer to help explain why.
And on the firm side, who wouldn’t want to know how they shake out competitively?
Of course, if you’re not convinced by Bob’s story, you can certainly keep doing it the “old” way.
But like smoking, seat belts, and bicycle helmets, the sentiment around this practice will change with or without you.
Our days of handing out million-dollar matters based on nothing more than a phone call to a law school alum or former firm colleague are numbered.
So I’ll ask you this:
Is it really…
The right firm?
The right team?
The right price?
The best strategy?
Now Bob knows.
And you can, too.
So what’s stopping you?
Cheers,
