NEW YORK, NY November 10, 2022: Priori Legal, the leading legal marketplace for in-house legal teams, today announced it was honored as a recipient of the Buying Legal Council (BLC) Collaboration Award in conjunction with Hearst for its work on an outside counsel decision-enabling platform called Scout.
In 2021, Priori and Hearst began a collaboration to use Priori’s powerful search and granular data-surfacing ability from its flagship Marketplace product to help in-house legal teams access insights about their existing, trusted firm relationships. Hearst, Zimmer Biomet, Marsh McLennan, a Fortune 10 company and Orrick were the beta cohort for Scout.
“Scout is a game changer for the legal industry. It creates a new category of legal department software that broadens and deepens in-house teams’ relationships with their external counsel,” commented An Trotter, Senior Director of Operations, Office of the General Counsel at Hearst. “Scout is setting a new standard for how corporate legal departments and law firms communicate. Having the legal procurement community recognize our collaborative effort is a strong testament to this product’s ability to deliver value and operational efficiency.”
Scout was designed to reduce friction in the procurement process by creating data-driven purpose-built search linked to matter management systems using a user-friendly interface. This two-sided ecosystem provides law department buyers with comprehensive transparency and information to make sound decisions while enabling law firms to showcase their expertise, experience and diversity to clients.
As part of the collaboration, Priori worked with Hearst to accomplish the following objectives:
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Identify specific expertise and experience of lawyers at preferred firms
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Distinguish which firms/lawyers had met Hearst’s criteria, including in areas such as diversity and pricing
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Understand engagement and relationship history with the respective firms
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Create an outside counsel performance feedback cycle.
Priori and Hearst workshopped the product specifications, design elements and data decisions to ensure that Scout would satisfy the needs of both in-house legal teams and procurement stakeholders. Scout was then used to identify and capture the most impactful data, display and update that information, and integrate with existing law department and firm systems.
Using Scout, Hearst has been empowered to make more informed outside counsel staffing decisions while saving an anticipated 325 hours annually.
“This award is a true testament to the strong collaboration between Priori, Hearst and the other beta users, and early adopter law firms,” said Basha Rubin, CEO and Co-Founder of Priori Legal. “In-house teams make spend decisions for millions of dollars per year on outside counsel with insufficient data. Scout helps solve this problem and this is a recognition of how game-changing Scout will be for the legal procurement community.”
Buying Legal Council Awards
The Buying Legal Council Legal Procurement Awards showcase the advances in legal procurement and legal procurement best practices. They honor those who are at the forefront of new developments and inspire others. The goal is to identify and acknowledge the best industry initiatives in five areas of legal procurement, including Innovation, Collaboration, Teamwork, Best Use of Technology and Process Improvement.
Legal procurement professionals from any industry and country can participate by submitting a detailed description of their project which includes the following – project goals, strategy and implementation, results from the project, a discussion of the budget and the project’s return on investment. Submissions for the awards were entered in a blind peer-review. All decisions were made unanimous among the judges – all of them legal procurement professionals.
Rethinking Outside Counsel Management
Priori works with in-house legal teams at companies of all sizes to connect legal departments with the right outside counsel for projects globally, saving them time and money. Priori’s clients include everything from Fortune 50 enterprises to leading technology companies. Marketplace is the company’s flagship product connecting in-house teams with Priori’s global vetted network of attorneys. Today, Marketplace provides access to more than 8,000 attorneys at firms of all sizes in all 50 states, 55 countries and covering more than 700 practice proficiencies.
Priori’s SaaS product, Scout, is an outside counsel panel management platform and is currently in beta with Hearst, Marsh McLennan, Zimmer Biomet, and a Fortune 10 company. More than 30 law firms, including Orrick, Priori’s beta law firm partner, and 13 other of the Law 50 firms, have joined Scout to share attorney and firm-level data with the clients.
About Priori Legal (‘Priori’)
Priori revolutionizes how legal teams find, engage, and manage outside counsel. Ranked a Chambers Tier 1 Global LawTech company and a Financial Times Intelligent Business, Priori’s cutting-edge technology powers two products that are redefining the procurement of legal services. Marketplace is a global platform that connects in-house legal teams with new talent from a vetted, global network of attorneys at firms of all sizes. Scout surfaces insights about trusted outside counsel relationships to drive informed hiring decisions and D&I initiatives. For more information, visit www.priorilegal.com.
Contact Information:
Priori Legal
Jill Black, Vice President, Marketing
713-560-9225
