Canadian Lawyer InHouse

17 CANADIANLAWYERMAG.COM/INHOUSE SEPTEMBER 2015 • Employee obligations AFAs for incoming and outgoing BMO em- ployees to use for advice in review- ing employment contracts. • Third-party claims AFAs. The team also created an internal customer-focused tracking feature to capture customer experiences in all lit- igation-related matters to identify pat- terns, so that LPMG can advise on how to improve on issues that may be fl agged as creating potential liability. "Litigators don't intuitively see them- selves as positively infl uencing customer experience," says Elharrar. "We really wanted to see the mindset of our in-house litigators evolve from being solely protectors of our brand to also being ambassadors of the bank's vision to defi ne great customer experi- ence even when we're dealing with the most diffi cult customer situations." The team also implemented clarifi ed ac- countability between BMO's employee rela- tions and the legal group for better legal risk management of employment law matters enter- prise-wide. Together with the legal e-discovery team, the litigators also worked on BMO's e-discovery practical guidelines to enhance the legal holds process and manage e-documents more effi ciently. This provided measurable savings on e-discovery matters at BMO. It also: • Created protocol for investigations conducted by BMO to effectively manage legal and regulatory risk. • Developed key Guidance for Setting and Communicating Provisions (Reserves). • Introduced metrics for measuring litigation prevention and customer experience. • Delivered litigation-related training to BMO's lines of business and corporate support areas on fi duciary risk, privilege protection, and legal risk management in reporting. • Developed best practices for privilege protection. "The LPMG's initiatives have streamlined and strengthened BMO's legal processes, and resulted in signifi cant cost savings," says El- harrar. "With the increased cost predictability alternative fee arrangements provide, we're able to contribute much more meaningfully to discussions with our businesses about fore- casting and planning. There's no question delivering value-based fees to our businesses demonstrates we care about the bottom line and we're here to help them meet their ob- jectives, and that strengthens our relation- ships with our businesses." IH SANDRA STRANGMORE BACK ROW (L TO R): Lesley Mercer Sarah Shody Kara Beitel Adrian Lang Laura McLaren Jennifer Cantwell Jane Waechter Christina MacDonald FRONT ROW (L TO R): Charlene Yaneza Isabella Massimi Sandeep Joshi Pascale Elharrar Kelly Bernard NOT PICTURED: Benjamin Apfel Keri Bush Julie Gallagher Stacy Howard Christine James Jeffrey Jamison, Patrice Jourdain Marc McKay Jean-Pierre Michaud Dina Raphael re-defining CATEGORY: Litigation Management DEPARTMENT SIZE: Large COMPANY: BMO Financial Group

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