ACC Xchange 2019: what legal ops professionals can expect
We’re two weeks away from the inaugural ACC Xchange being held in Minneapolis, MN. This reimagined conference combines the Association of Corporate Counsel’s Mid-Year Meeting and Legal Operations Conference into one powerful event. We’re breaking down what this new event is all about and which sessions and demos legal ops professionals should look out for to walk away with strategic and tactical advice.
Perspectives from All In-House Professionals
Past ACC Legal Operations Conferences were structured so that legal ops professionals had the opportunity to mingle with like-minded individuals who were also involved in operational initiatives. ACC’s move to combine the conference with their Mid-Year Meeting gives those in the legal ops function a new opportunity to connect with their seasoned in-house counsel counterparts during educational sessions. This broader collection of perspectives helps to shape a more in-depth discussion around the role legal ops has on running an efficient and effective legal department.
Focus on Leadership and Business
According to ACC, CLOs identify business management as the number one non-legal skill desired for their lawyers and in-house members. In response, Xchange is offering key leadership and business training curriculum on:
- Change management
- Leveraging the power of metrics
- Managerial accounting
- Prioritizing and implementing initiatives
- Interrupting unconscious bias
Continual education on these topics is instrumental for legal operations professionals who are emerging as the right-hand (wo)man to GCs and CLOs and actively looking to build a more efficient department through spend control, technology, cross-functional collaboration, change management, and more.
Interest Group Meetings
Each morning from 8:15am – 9:30am, the Xchange will kick off with interest group meetings centered around these topics:
- Tools and Technology
- Process, Project, and Knowledge Management
- Information Governance and eDiscovery
- Health Care Manufacturing
- Internal Resources Management
- External Resources Management
- Strategic Planning
- Metrics and Analytics
These interest group meetings are not open to sponsors and are a great way for legal operations professionals to have conversations around challenges they and their team are facing in regards to a specific topic.
Flexibility for Legal Operations Maturity Levels
Each day of the Xchange has an hour and a half time slot from 12:30pm – 2pm that can be customized to each attendee’s legal ops goals and individual needs. In addition to using this time to grab lunch, there are a variety of tech talks and roundtable discussions to join featuring topics from how to leverage legal ops software to transforming the outside counsel engagement process.
Meet SimpleLegal at the Xchange
SimpleLegal is a proud sponsor of the ACC Xchange and can’t wait to meet you at the event. Stop by our booth or attend our session on Aligning Legal Processes for Success in the Grand Ballroom F on Tuesday at 2:15pm. Our CEO, Nathan Wenzel, will be joined by the fantastic:
- Lesley Garafola, Director, Legal Operations, Barings
- Katrina Keiffer, Law Department Senior Manager, Navistar, Inc.
- Ryan Murphy, Director, Legal & Public Affairs, Business Operations, LyondellBasell Industries
Can’t wait for the Xchange? Learn how legal tech helped LyondellBasell align legal processes for success!
We’ll be discussing how today’s legal departments are expected to run efficiently like a business and the role legal operations has in ensuring the legal department has standardized procedures to align with business processes and goals.
If you’d like to schedule dedicated time during the Xchange to see our legal operations platform in action, click here – and if you can’t make the Xchange, we’d be more than happy to schedule a personalized demo for you and your team outside the conference.