Scott R. Jablonski, with Berger Singerman in Fort Lauderdale.

The COVID-19 pandemic forced droves of change-resistant lawyers to embrace mobile technology as necessary to provide continuity of service—a sort of involuntary re-engineering of fundamental tasks. Many lawyers discovered an unexpected benefit—their clients were happier with the streamlined, technology-powered service they received. There is a lesson here for all lawyers, but especially for those of us on the transactional side.

Notwithstanding the recent widespread, rapid success in remote lawyering, we are barely scratching the surface by running video calls and marking up invoices on our tablets, initiating electronic signature packets from our laptops, or using cellphone apps for real-time notetaking and collaboration with our teams. While commendable, fostering a continuous improvement environment in law firms must involve something more than adopting "low-hanging fruit" technological solutions just because the office is temporarily closed. It has to involve a commitment to exploring and using better processes, including leveraging innovative legal technology, to do better for clients.

The legal services industry is under pressure to adopt delivery models that are practical and proportionally sophisticated, lean, responsive, swift, consistent, collaborative and agile. Such models foster a more client-focused approach to services because they shorten the path to delivering value. Process thinking nurtures that approach because it adds structure to the often-subjective exercise of defining client value. Unfortunately, traditional models have not facilitated process thinking, including the adoption of technology.

Before we re-engineer how we practice law, however, some clarifications are in order. For the cynical practitioner, the trends are not entirely driven by generic pressure to provide a better product faster and for less cost. For the fearful type, they do not mean that sophisticated business clients expect a commoditized process for everything. The reality is more nuanced: outdated delivery models will sooner than later struggle to be competitive for all but arguably the largest law firms because they do not encourage a continuous improvement environment which enables delivery of greater value where it is plainly and immediately possible to do so.

So how do we as deal lawyers embrace process thinking and its favorite general, innovative technology, to create more value?

• Practicality and Proportionality. Legal project management (LPM) tactics deployed at the outset of a transaction to engage in deal scoping and budgeting, to identify key business drivers and deliverables, to clarify tasks and timelines, to establish desired communication protocols, and to collect data in advance to streamline deal milestones and the closing process, frame a better overall deal experience. Pre-formatted, cloud-based spreadsheets and document forms, or a more sophisticated project management software solution, can mediate such tactics.

• Lean. Cloud-based deal management platforms enhance transactional efficiency and transparency, and reduce waste, through real-time closing checklist collaboration, centralized version exchange and tracking, and improved signature collection and closing processes, and by greatly truncating the closing binder process.

• Responsiveness, Speed and Consistency. Artificial Intelligence (AI), including machine-based document automation solutions, reduces time-intensive due diligence tasks as well as document review, creation, formatting and proofing time, not to mention improving overall turnaround time. Data shows that such usage also increases work product quality by having the capacity to reduce errors at unparalleled rates.

• Collaboration. Collaboration applications streamline internal deal team and/or attorney-client communication in a way that traditional communication methods cannot do alone. Automating and linking deal data, notes, documents and tasks across multiple devices reduces redundancy and errors in workflow and product, reduces lawyer deal stress and client anxiety, and improves delegation and optimization based on skillset and experience.

• Agility. Integration of knowledge management software organizes and centralizes the way deal information is collected, stored, and accessed by an entire team to advance future deals more efficiently and build upon returning client preferences, as well as to pivot and tailor services quickly for new clients with similar matters and issues in different industries. It also enhances deal lawyer mentoring and training by making knowledge and tips among a team readily accessible, which ultimately serves clients' best interests.

For a vetted list of targeted technologies that seek to improve processes, see the ABA's Directory of Technologies from its Technology in M&A Subcommittee, as a starting point.

I respectfully suggest that achieving better client value in the future will require at least a meaningful level of attention as to how we provide legal services or, perhaps better stated, can do so. Even our most creative counseling is not immune to the benefits of process thinking. Yes, our ingenuity and diligent end products will always matter, and tremendously so. Deal lawyers may want to take note, though, that it seems we have officially entered an era where our processes themselves cannot be ignored in order to deliver the greatest value to our clients.

Scott "SJ" R. Jablonski is a partner at Berger Singerman in Fort Lauderdale.