vangard | Littler – Success through Innovation
Interview
vangard | Littler – Success through Innovation
Interview with Sebastian Juli · Lawyer and Partner · Law Firm Blog
The law firm vangard | Littler won the Best of Legal Award from Wirtschaftswoche in the category “New Work & Culture”. The law firm uses timeSensor LEGAL at five locations and has 120 workstations. Growth continues – but what is the recipe for success?
Mr. Juli, why the name “vangard”?
The name vangard is inspired by the French “avant-garde” and expresses how we see ourselves as a law firm. We are progressive and rely on the most modern technology to solve the challenges of our Clients. This makes vangard | Littler a leading law firm in the legal tech sector.
Tradition Meets Innovation
Employment law, in which the law firm vangard specializes, is characterized by rapid social and technological change. This requires an open mind for the essentials. Clients expect us to understand new approaches and to be genuine “problem solvers” – not nay-sayers.
Hierarchy-Free Culture as an Innovation Driver
Our hierarchy-free law firm culture is the basis for innovation. Because only together as a team of lawyers and assistants can we develop the best solutions for ourselves and our Clients. The robotic solutions we already use are a good example of this. Without the know-how of our entire team for processes and procedures in legal consulting, this would not be possible.
Another prerequisite is that, unlike other law firms, we do not impose any billable hour targets on our lawyers. This creates room for innovation. Only in this way is it possible for us to automate the creation of more and more documents.
Our motto: “One for all, all for one.” Everyone should benefit from each other’s work. This applies internally to us, but also to our Clients.
The Decision for timeSensor LEGAL
During the selection process, it was important for us to find software that not only focused on the needs of the secretariat but also those of the lawyers. timeSensor LEGAL was more user-friendly than other systems and easier for our entire team to use. If the law firm management software is only used by the secretariat, its benefits remain limited.
Furthermore, the timeSensor company proved to be more dynamic and flexible than other providers. For example, data had to be migrated from heterogeneous systems at the locations, such as Filemaker or ra-micro, and consolidated into one database. timeSensor was able to offer this to us through the concept of data rooms. Thus, each location has its own area within the vangard database, and yet the data is available across all locations.
IT Landscape and Data Rooms
Like many medium and larger law firms, vangard has also virtualized its infrastructure. This scalability has allowed us to manage the law firm’s growth well in recent years. vangard now has around 120 workstations at five locations, and growth continues.
As for the software side, the collaboration with timeSensor has proven to be a real stroke of luck. Only through close exchange with timeSensor AG is it possible for us to connect all software components with each other. In timeSensor LEGAL, we record all data that we process in our central data warehouse. This allows us to combine all data from time tracking, invoices, revenues, and costs with content information from the Matters.
vangard | Littler advises based on data. In this way, the experience and expertise of all approximately 70 lawyers at vangard | Littler benefit our Clients.
This creates transparency that also benefits our Clients – e.g., in complex international restructurings.
Recommendations for Law Firms
Ensure that the innovation process is driven by all employees, including partners. Select agile and interested suppliers and organize regular telcos so that goals and milestones remain on everyone’s radar.
Bring the team along by involving them early, but don’t let the doubters and skeptics slow you down.
The speed of social and technological change will not decrease – it is better to actively shape the process than to run after it.
Sebastian Juli — Specialist lawyer for employment law and founding partner of vangard in Düsseldorf. Sebastian Juli is one of “Germany’s best lawyers” in employment law according to Handelsblatt/Best Lawyers, 2020.
