“What does good look like in outside counsel management?”
This is a question we frequently receive from PERSUIT users, and we're excited to provide an answer with a new addition to our Insights functionality: Program Benchmarking.
This new feature allows in-house teams to gauge their performance against other legal departments on PERSUIT — both within their industry and outside of it — and identify areas for improvement.
Understand Your Performance, Clearly Define Success
Every legal department strives for excellence — managing outside counsel relationships is no exception. However, defining what success looks like can be challenging without tangible data across the legal landscape.
PERSUIT Program Benchmarking empowers you to compare your legal program with other organizations based on the criteria that matter most to you.
Let’s say you are working on diversity initiatives or company-wide cost control measures.
Do you know what good looks like for a legal department?
Is what you’re doing today enough to get you there?
With PERSUIT’s new Program Benchmarking capabilities, you can easily toggle between industries for comparison and see how your department stacks up against in-house legal departments globally on PERSUIT — on the basis of savings, diversity measures, AFA usage, efficiency, and more.
With dozens of benchmarks available, you can evaluate your performance, identify areas for improvement, and set ambitious goals.
Let’s take a look at what’s possible.
How Program Benchmarking Can Help You Better Measure and Define Success
Program Benchmarking is divided into five essential categories, each providing unique insights into your program's performance:
1. Program Overview
How often do you leverage AFAs and how much on average do you save per matter through PERSUIT?
Understand high-level metrics that provide a snapshot of your PERSUIT program.
2. Coverage
Are there matters in a particular area of law that your peers put through PERSUIT more often than you?
Gain insights into how your proposals are distributed across different regions, services, and areas of law. Identify patterns and expand your platform usage.
3. Diversity
Where does your legal department rank in terms of driving diversity from your legal suppliers?
Measure the utilization of PERSUIT’s Diversity Module and track the awarding of work to diverse firms. Uncover opportunities to foster diversity and inclusion within your outside counsel relationships.
4. Efficiency
Are you taking too long to get requests out the door compared to other legal teams?
Assess the efficiency of your RFP process, from creation to proposal selection. Examine average durations and identify areas for improvement to save time and resources.
5. Workflow Completion
How good is your team at closing out requests compared to the industry?
Gauge the completion rate of your RFPs, including work awarded and feedback provided. Ensure a smooth workflow from start to finish, maximizing the value and outcomes of your engagements.
Once inside the Program Benchmarking page, users can seamlessly switch between each of these categories and select one or multiple industries to compare. All charts will update in real-time, giving you a sense of where your team stands at all times.
Program Benchmarking is available to all accounts, and specifically users with Insights permissions. If you don’t have access, simply reach out to your CSM to get set up!
If you’re new to PERSUIT and you’d like to see Program Benchmarking in action, schedule some time with us here.