errors are detected quickly. “Fail fast” is the motto and this can also be relevant for legal work. Anyone with a few years of experience in the legal profession knows that sometimes you can get bogged down in a factual interpretation or legal opinion. If you have worked on a brief for several nights, you can easily become blind to certain facts. Only when you then hold the judgement in your hands do you realise what you have overlooked. Therefore, it is of course sensible if the pros and cons of an argument are discussed in the team. The SWOT analysis was invented for this discussion. Strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats are visualised in a magic square. Using the SWOT analysis, which is again filled in by several team members on SharePoint, a common litigation strategy can be developed and specifically checked for weaknesses. How does this translate into daily practice? Complex briefs and opinions have been created in this way for some time now using SharePoint relational tables and SWOT analysis. We first form a small team. Each team member receives a task in the research of facts and legal situation. Everyone feeds their result into SharePoint and then the team performs the SWOT analysis together. Finally, one team member takes over the consolidation of the text to create a work “from one piece”. Can you please give an example of how that works in practice? Consider last year’s scenario when we were asked to represent various German states in litigation regarding a corona emergency procurement. Within a few days, we had to submit many extensive briefs with hundreds of pages of text to different chambers and courts. The facts differed in all essential points and concerned technically complex processes. The legal issues were also challenging. Without a system of structured cooperation in a larger team, we would not have been able to cope with this challenge. What is AIs role in the agile organization Artificial Intelligence helps us draft briefs, research facts and create presentations. As we work in an integrated team of lawyers, trainees and paralegals, AI helps us to standardise work with our knowledge management. Especially trained AI already today leads to fantastic results, constantly improving by working with additional cases. We certainly expect to improve profitability by integrating AI in our daily work. How does the agile workstyle translate into office space? Recently, we ventured into the experiment of making our physical work environment more flexible. We now draw lots for the workplaces every fortnight. Lawyers, trainees and project managers (we no longer have assistants) now sit mixed in two- or three-person offices. Anyone who has a longer phone call or video conference to conduct retreats to a designated “focus room”. Remote work is also an option for those who find it more suitable. Especially for the trainees, the new office world is of course an improvement. They get a much more direct impression of the legal work and are more involved in interesting cases than before. The project managers also grow into legal work. Increasingly, they take on tasks that perhaps a lawyer would have done before. Finally, what conclusions can be drawn from the experience? Agile is fun. Teamwork is fun. The agile work structure gives self-efficacy to every team member. Providing selfefficacy to the team reduces sickness rates and frequent job changes. It, therefore, improves the quality of work and finally leads to more client satisfaction. WWW.LAWYER-MONTHLY.COM 85
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