For more detail please go to the testimonial page.
In 2014 I was asked to do a series of half day seminars about legal project management by the Association of Costs Lawyers (ACL).
The seminars were well received and so began my work with costs lawyers.
I get a regular flow of costs lawyers on my IILPM accredited training courses and I am delighted to say that I have contributed to Dr Mark Friston’s 3rd edition of Friston on Costs, which includes a new chapter about legal project management.
HOW TO MAKE LEGAL PROJECT MANAGEMENT WORK IN PRACTICE
The most frequent question I get asked by costs lawyers is ‘how can I make legal project management work in practice?’.
I help them with this and during my course I also have a regular ‘Alumni slot’ where previous course graduates return and explain how they have applied the course in practice. I am particularly grateful to Simon Murray, Partner and Head of Costs at DWF, who regularly fills my Alumni slot with knowledge, insight and practical tips for implementation.
OPERATIONAL LEADERSHIP, NOT JUST MANAGEMENT
Although there are plenty of challenges facing costs lawyers, I genuinely do believe they are very well placed to take on the role of legal project managers.
Cost management is a fundamental part of legal project management and of course costs lawyers already have this covered.
The legal scenario I most often use is one based on civil litigation, and through this I show how lawyers of all kinds can improve their scoping, estimation, client communications and team building skills.
On the third day of my course I also devote quite a bit of time to legal project leadership skills. Generally, I see too many legal project managers being content with managing rather than leading legal projects from an operational point of view. This needs to change and I think costs lawyers are very well placed to assume the role of legal project leaders in the right circumstances. My course provides costs lawyers with the project management knowledge, tools and techniques to allow them to perform this role successfully.
INTERNATIONALLY RECOGNISED CERTIFICATION
Having a recognised legal project management certification, after attending a course designed by lawyers for lawyers, cost lawyers should feel more confident about taking on an operational leadership role especially in the context of complex litigation.
At the end of the course attendees will become certified and registered as either Legal Project Associates (LPAs) or Legal Project Practitioners (LPPs) with the International Institute of Legal Project Management (IILPM).
Costs lawyers can claim CPD points by attending my course as the IILPM is an accredited body with the Costs Lawyers Standards Board.
If you would like to become a Legal Project Associate (LPA), then you must attend the first two days of one of my training courses scheduled below.
If you would like to become a Legal Project Practitioner (LPP) then you must attend all three days of one of my training courses scheduled below.
SUMMARY: WHAT YOU WILL GAIN BY ATTENDING ONE OF MY COURSES
1. An understanding about how to apply project management techniques to legal matters. You will become fully conversant about project management concepts and terminology by the end of the course and, most importantly, you will be able to explain and apply them in the context of legal service delivery.
2. Improved leadership skills as you will be capable and confident of leading legal project teams to help ensure successful outcomes.
3. Insights about how to convince clients of your legal project management skills.
4. How to go about improving your organisation’s processes and procedures to help improve legal service delivery, including how to implement legal project management successfully.
5. Certification as a Legal Project Associate (LPA) or Legal Project Practitioner (LPP) as administered by the International Institute of Legal Project Management (IILPM). Upon successful completion of the course, you will receive a hard-copy certificate, commendation letter and business card confirming your certification status. You will also be entered on the database of registered legal project professionals maintained by the IILPM.
COURSE DELIVERABLES
- Written notes covering all topics referred to in each course.
- IILPM Templates which can be used to execute key tasks found in legal project management.
- Practical workshops: my public courses have practical workshops and exercises baked in. Experience shows these really help students better understand key concepts and develop their legal project management skills. I often find that in my public courses particularly, people learn almost as much from each other as they do from me – the course is a great opportunity to network, share experiences and learn about what other people are doing.
- I usually recommend that any in-house training should also include workshops and exercises whenever possible and that they be based on real problems facing the legal service delivery team (I can work with you to create workshops and exercises tailored for you).
- Alumni slots: I am delighted to say that past graduates of my public courses volunteer to do short ‘alumni slots’ where they return and explain to course participants how they have applied lessons learned during the course while they develop legal project management capability in their law firm or in-house legal department.
- Post course follow-up: few things are as frustrating as completing a course full of new ideas and enthusiasm, only to find when you return to work course notes get filed away as the daily demands of job take over again. I am really keen that course graduates get to apply legal project management after training. With this in mind I keep in touch with all course graduates. I also offer course graduates three hours of free consultancy advice (via telephone or skype). I find the people who take up this offer are usually those charged with implementing legal project management in their organisation. Some people continue the consultations, which become chargeable after the three hours.
SUMMARY COURSE OUTLINE
Broadly the course is in two parts.
- The first two days we work through the core elements of the IILPM 4-Phase LPM framework:
- Matter Definition
- Matter Planning
- Matter Delivery and
- Matter Close.
- Then on day three we consider legal project leadership including how to further improve legal service delivery using Agile, Process Mapping and I.T. support for LPM.
DOWNLOAD COURSE PROSPECTUS
To find more detail about the course, please download the prospectus by clicking on the image adjacent.
WORKSHOPS AND EXERCISES
My teaching style is informal, but please be aware that this is an intensive course. I appreciate that it is quite a commitment for legal service professionals to take three days out of their business as usual activities to attend a training course. So my commitment to you in return is a course which is comprehensive, engaging and at times challenging.
With this in mind, please be prepared to fully engage and participate in the workshops and exercises.
Students usually get a lot out of the workshops and exercises. Everyone particularly enjoys the opportunity to work alongside a wide range of professionals engaged in legal service delivery. My previous courses have been attended by solicitors, barristers, cost lawyers, in-house lawyers, government lawyers, professional support lawyers, business development professionals and project managers.
RESERVE YOUR PLACE AND ORDER
I run training courses online and face to face.
If you would like to see online training options, please go to the online training course page.
If you would like to see face to face training options for my public courses please go to the face to face training course page.