Why is legal always so slow?

Roman Koch, Commercial Legal Counsel EMEA at ManpowerGroup, unpacks the real reasons legal teams are seen as slow and what in-house lawyers can do to fix it.

“The business always sends things at the last minute.”
“Expectations are totally unrealistic.”
“They do not involve us at the right time”

If you’re working in-house, I’m sure you’ve said (or at least thought) these things more than once.

And I am sure, they’re frustrating.

But here’s a question we don’t usually ask:
What if the real problem isn’t “the business”?
What if these complaints are just symptoms of deeper issues?

From my perspective, these aren’t people problems, but problems with processes and organisational culture.

I will not give you a quick fix to these problems. There are several root causes that you need to identify first. Here are the most common ones in almost every organisation:

There’s no structured intake process for legal matters.
– Legal team does not have time or resources for continuous improvement efforts or there is limited knowledge on how to implement such an intake process.

At least this problem is relatively easy to fix. You can start with a basic intake form using available Microsoft 365 tools or tools such as Jira, Asana or ServiceNow.

“There is a culture of accommodating all requests to avoid conflict or appear helpful.”

Legal is being involved only for emergencies.
– Legal is not integrated into project planning or decision-making processes.

While building relationships with project managers is relatively straightforward (in fact, most of them understands the role of legal very well), earning a seat at the table with decision makers is a tougher, long-term effort. It requires consistently demonstrating the value that legal brings to the organisation (more on this soon).

We’ve taught people that legal is always available.
– There is a culture of accommodating all requests to avoid conflict or appear helpful.
– Legal has not engaged with other teams or leadership to formalise involvement (e.g., by establishing internal SLAs).

This is quite a similar case as the previous one. In addition it requires legal team to explain where the risks are and what is the complexity of legal work as well as understanding what are the business priorities and finding right balance between them.

Legal is seen as a blocker.
– Because there is limited alignment between legal and business goals, or there is misalignment between company’s risk appetite and the perception of risks by legal.

A lot can be written about this, as the solution comes down to being recognised as a business partner.

The business does not understand that there may be a legal risk or does not understand the complexity of legal work.
– Because there is no proper legal training program for the business.

Surprisingly, business values legal training a lot and from my experience the training really works. It requires time and effort, but this investment brings high yields quite quickly.

I am sure, that many of you are facing similar challenges. If you are an in-house lawyer, I’d love to hear your thoughts on how to face them. 

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