Canadian Lawyer InHouse

41 CANADIANLAWYERMAG.COM/INHOUSE JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2018 P r o f e s s i o n a l P r o f i l e inflection point" in the provision of legal services for the future. "Law firms can no longer afford to sit in their ivory towers in a vaucum without any surrounding context or client sensitivity. Archimedes said 'give me a place to stand and I will move the earth' — we want to give law firms a place to stand. We are saying partner with us and come and listen to what our businesses have to say and we will help you become more successful because we will all be aligned with this." Last month, BMO held its first Legal Excellence Program's law firm summit in which it invited law firms that are part of BMO's established panel to come for a day to listen to the senior leaders in business explain what BMO's business priorities are, what the risk appetite is and how they see the future for the business. "Hopefully, the law firms will learn from that — we've had a very good uptake and what's been encouraging is they want to come along and see how they can best po - sition themselves for the future. They ac- knowledge it's important — some have said it's the first one of its kind to be organized," says Stewart. A number of U.K. firms also came to the conference. "I really see us as setting our - selves up for success in the future," he says. At the heart of BMO's LXP is an effort to move away from the billable hour model toward something "more value add and more visible." "The law firms have embraced it and ac - knowledged the billable hour won't always be the right thing and that we need certain- ty of visibility," he says. The next iteration of BMO's LXP will bring all of its law firms on to one joined billing mandate — "nose to tail" — as Stew- art explains it, using the bank's TyMetrix billing system. "That then allows us to be more techno- logically focused on being able to slice and dice statistics and see where we are getting good value for money," he says. "We're not in this to cut the law firms to the bone; we see it as a win-win as a mutual partnering. Yes, we will have lower fees, but if law firms work smarter, more technologi - cally focused, then they will also be able to benefit from it. If we have [a] fixed-fee ar- rangement, we don't care how they do the work as long as they deliver it," he says. So, will the future legal department deci- sion-makers be the chief operating officers? "I think that's not an unreasonable as- sumption," says Stewart. "Yes, while the GC will always have an important role in the relationship with the law firms, to a de- gree the COO is the gatekeeper to the rest of the legal team — we are the quarterback — the primary relationship will be through the law firms and the line of business law- yers because they are in the trenches day in and day out. They have gone through the trial by fire, but we in the COO role can overlay the strategy and get to the customer experience that helps law firms achieve even greater things." IH SECOND SNAPSHOT T H E L A W Y E R Richard Stewart T H E C O M P A N Y BMO Financial Group Inc. • Deputy general counsel and chief operating officer. • Was head of legal for capital markets in the U.K. based in London. • Will be rolling out BMO's Legal Excellence Program to Europe. • Says next iteration of the bank's Legal Excellence Program will bring all law firms on to one billing mandate "nose to tail." • What makes good legal ops person? "Have an innate curiosity about how things work and use that curiosity to challenge things."

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