“It’s in society’s best interests to have the most outputs produced by the least inputs.” These are the words of Warren Buffet, a celebrated investor and one of the world’s wealthiest people. He believes that if your organization’s mundane, yet critical tasks can be done by a third party better and more cost-effectively than you can do them in-house, then you should outsource. And we couldn’t agree more!
Outsourcing is a powerful tool that can be leveraged not only by law firms but a host of other industries as well. It significantly reduces operating costs, including wages for personnel, equipment, technology, and overhead. Outsourcing also enables you to focus on more value-adding responsibilities as you let the external experts take care of other tasks.
In this article, we’ll take a deeper dive into the benefits of outsourcing tasks in your law firm, plus the procedure for doing so. Let’s jump right in!
The Key Benefits of Outsourcing Tasks in Your Law Firm
Legal outsourcing has become more popular than ever as many law firms have realized what they stand to gain from making such a move. We’re talking about saving on costs, enjoying the services of trained professionals, round-the-clock support, flexibility, more efficiency, and more. Here’s a more in-depth look at the top five benefits of outsourcing legal services:
Cost Savings
Outsourcing is one of the most potent means of lowering the costs of your legal services. For starters, your law firm can significantly save on overhead by contracting a freelance legal support expert rather than hiring a full-time in-house attorney. By doing so you will eliminate regular salaries, benefits, sick leaves, office space and equipment, plus other expenses that come with full-time employment.
But let’s face it a law firm can’t run without in-house lawyers. However, the cost of recruiting and training new lawyers is unimaginable, especially if you’re a sizeable firm. The good news is you can outsource an independent recruiting agency at a fraction of the cost, and they’ll recruit and train the best attorneys on your behalf.
Access to the Best External Talent
Your firm shouldn’t be the Jack of all trades as far as law practice is concerned. There are several external talents with overflowing knowledge and experience in diverse practice areas that your firm can tap. The idea here is to expand your practice area expertise by subcontracting particular legal services to freelance lawyers without hiring them permanently. And the reward? You meet more clients’ needs hence higher satisfaction rates.
For example, if your firm lacks litigation support and your in-house team is either preoccupied or lacks the experience to handle processes like document review or coding, you can outsource to the experts. Offshore outsourcing also grants you access to global talents who are self-motivated and highly qualified in diverse fields.
Enhanced Flexibility
Having both the in-house and external talent at your service enhances your law firm’s versatility, enabling you to quickly and efficiently attend to client needs. Like any other business or organization, the workload may vary periodically.
Some clients may leave as others come in, and some complex cases may require more resources and personnel while others may not. The good news is that if you outsource legal processes, a change in the workflow may not affect your operations. You can add or reduce your freelance attorneys accordingly to match the situation. This flexibility enables you to take on larger workloads worry-free, knowing that an external talent pool is only one call away.
Round-the-Clock Services
With outsourced legal processes, you can never fall short of services whenever the need arises. More so, if you outsource to offshore freelance attorneys with different time zones to the US, you can rest assured of non-stop support, even during after-hours.
For instance, contracting a freelance lawyer in a country like India allows your firm to complete critical tasks within the shortest period, thanks to the 12-hour time difference. So, if you have a court meeting the following day, you can ask your India-based legal expert to prepare the paperwork at night (daytime in India) such that by the time of waking up, everything’s set.
Access to the Latest Technology
By outsourcing legal processes, your in-house team can enjoy tons of awe-inspiring technologies, research tools, and storage services. And if you outsource litigation support, you also get access to critical automated functions like billing and time management from top-rated legal software like LawBillity.
The best part is that your law firm doesn’t have to invest in the infrastructure directly, as that would be part of the litigation support provided by your contracted team.
Step-by-Step Procedure for Outsourcing Legal Works at Your Law Firm
Below is a detailed outsourcing procedure that will ensure you find the best third-party entity to entrust with your legal process:
Evaluate Your Needs
What tasks or processes do you need help from outsourced attorneys to complete? Since the legal industry has diverse practice areas, and each firm has unique needs, here are a few questions you need to seek answers for when looking to outsource part of your services:
- What tasks and processes take a lot of billable hours and resources but can be completed off-premise?
- Does the freelance attorney need to be stationed on your premises?
- Should they offer court appearance services?
- Is it okay to work remotely?
Clearly Define Your Purpose and the Desired Outcome
You’ve already evaluated your needs and ear-marked the processes fit for outsourcing. But what’s your desired endgame for taking such an initiative? Before signing the contract with your outsourced team, you must ensure you’re reading from the same script.
This calls for the setting of ground rules and acceptable standards to guide your freelancer’s performance. They must know what’s expected of them, as well as what your firm doesn’t tolerate, before putting pen on paper.
Select the Right Outsourced Party for the Task
Choosing the provider that can match your needs and bare minimums doesn’t have to be a daunting task. When interviewing different prospects, you want to lean more towards the expertise, skills, and experience while keeping the interaction conversational. Let them provide you with testimonials and a list of previous/existing clients to verify their authenticity.
Don’t forget to check their websites to have a firsthand touch of what you’re about to get into. You should also consider organizing face-to-face meetings (in-person or virtual) with selected candidates to clear the ground on what your firm doesn’t tolerate. Also, be objective about routine requirements like periodical reports.
Conclusion
The benefits of making a move to outsourcing tasks in your law firm does not need to be overwhelming and is 100% worth exploring. With LawBillity you can automate your firm’s time and expense tracking and invoicing, including tracking outsource freelancer’s time and activities. Start your 14-day FREE trial today!
