From the pandemic to social-justice movements to political drama, 2020 impacted our lives in some big ways. Even the slow-moving legal profession saw its share of upheaval and change. It wasn’t so much the litigation workflow itself that changed, but rather the overall environment and macro-trends that legal teams are dealing with. Here are a few takeaways from the past year, followed by a bit of crystal-ball gazing at what lies ahead in 2021.
IT pressures, remote work, and expanding remits
More than anything, the pandemic has strained corporate legal teams’ relationship with IT. Even in the best of times, IT had a long list of priorities to serve the needs of the larger business. The pandemic just added to IT’s to-do list. Meanwhile, legal teams have been under pressure to do more with less, leading to even greater need to adopt and roll out in-house ediscovery and legal hold tools.
