First things first: Strategy in Times of Change

Strategic planning is the process in which the company establishes its direction and makes decisions about the allocation of resources to achieve its objectives. It is used to set priorities, focus energy and resources, strengthen operations, and ensure that all employees are working toward shared goals. We also may say it is the process of adjusting the direction of the company in response to changes.

Strategic plans are our dashboards to achieve our vision, and therefore vital to ensure the success of our organization. A few years ago, however, in one of the seminars that we organized to share the best practices in the business of law management, with the room full of representatives of law firms from Latin American and Caribbean, only one lawyer replied that his firm had a strategic plan in place. Something to think about ...

In the legal profession, in the last two decades, the processes of change have been continuous. Therefore, in addition to following the principles for the development of strategic plans, the role of leaders is to focus their efforts on learning and organizational development through each step of the changing environment. Effective change management in the legal industry has become the differentiating factor for successful law firms.

The speed and impact of developments determine whether the change process is strategic or transformational. Right now, the world is in the transformational change, where everything happens quickly and there are few opportunities to return to the safety of "how it was before COVID-19."

The STEP system is a common strategic planning tool used to identify social, technological, economic and political factors in the environment or new normal.

The situational analysis verifies specific areas within and outside the organization and identifies the steps to follow to improve and address internal weaknesses and threats from the outside environment.

In times of crisis, we look for ways to innovate and to reinvent. Of course, the execution of the creative ideas will depend on the implementation of the strategic plans, through data analysis, indicators, and the balanced scorecard, among others. Some key principles are: your talents well motivated and aligned, robust technology in a case or legal project management, having the operational processes well documented, and maintaining good communication. And finally, we must stress that the role of leadership is vital in every process, and especially in transformational change processes.   

Angelina Angelov