At the 2025 CLOC Global Institute, I had the privilege of hosting an ELM Solutions panel discussion entitled “Transforming Legal Operations: From Administrative Support to Strategic Enabler.” The session featured legal operations leaders from highly regulated industries, each with a different path into legal ops but a shared commitment to redefining the role for added business benefits.
Our panelists – Stacy Lettie, Chief of Staff to the GC at Organon; Maitane Arozena, Head of Legal Technology and Program Services at Citi; and Dana Harris, Director, Head of Law Department Projects at Equitable – had an insightful conversation about how legal ops professionals can drive business value through strategic thinking, process transformation, and purposeful partnerships. Here are a few key takeaways from that discussion.
Defining what it means to be strategic
One of the first questions we tackled was how to define "strategic." The answers were powerful. Strategy isn’t just about sitting at the leadership table; it’s about seeing what’s coming, aligning with broader business goals, and shaping the future through intentional, data-driven decisions.
Being strategic is about staying one step ahead of your next action. It’s about using your time and perspective to guide the department forward, rather than getting stuck in the day-to-day.
Legal operations can be viewed as a spectrum of responsibilities. On one end, administrative tasks involve essential but routine activities, like scheduling meetings and arranging travel. On the other end, tactical work focuses on achieving specific objectives, such as implementing new tools, streamlining workflows, and managing compliance effectively. Strategic work takes it a step further. This work involves evaluating long-term priorities, designing scalable solutions, and connecting legal work with enterprise-wide objectives. As Maitane noted, the difference often comes down to the mindset: firefighting vs. fire prevention planning.
Reshaping role, process, and tech to drive impact
Stacy shared how she stepped into a new role and was quickly handed a long list of administrative tasks. After assessing the situation, she made the case for shifting focus to areas where she could deliver real business value. That shift allowed Stacy to focus on higher-value tasks, such as leading cross-functional projects that had enterprise-level impact.
Her story serves as an important reminder for legal ops professionals to regularly ask themselves: What tasks am I handling that I don’t truly need to? By freeing up time from low-value activities, you create the opportunity to focus on work that drives meaningful, transformative impact. The panel highlighted several examples where administrative systems were elevated into strategic tools. In one example, Dana’s team replaced a decentralized intake process with a central portal tool. This change not only reduced inefficiencies but also improved satisfaction among both attorneys and support staff.
The panel also discussed using billing guidelines and automation to flag and reduce noncompliant charges from outside counsel. By building rules into the billing system and training bill reviewers, legal teams can achieve measurable savings and demonstrate clear ROI to leadership. Stacy, for example, was able to save her legal department more than $1.6 million in 18 months.
Embedding change and communicating outside of legal
Change management frequently came up in the conversation. The panel emphasized the need to build change into every stage of a project, from planning to rollout to ongoing optimization. That includes listening carefully to stakeholders, identifying executive sponsors, and taking the time to understand the root causes of resistance.
Panelists also agreed that legal can’t be strategic in isolation. Partnerships with finance, risk, sourcing, procurement, and IT are essential. These relationships help legal ops teams stay aligned with enterprise priorities and deliver better outcomes for the business.
Measuring performance is one of the best ways to showcase the value of legal operations. Whether it’s a dashboard, a project tracker, or a handful of KPIs, the goal is to make your team’s impact visible. Don’t get overwhelmed by perfection. It’s fine to start with one meaningful metric. Show how your work is making a difference and build from there. Progress matters more than polish.
Transformation doesn’t happen all at once. It starts with a mindset shift, a small win, or a new partnership. Begin by asking what strategic work looks like for you right now, not compared to others, but based on your current role and goals. Use active listening to dig into the needs of your business and the people working in it. Approach every challenge with curiosity and make it a priority to understand what your colleagues do and how their work connects to broader objectives. That’s where true strategic impact begins.
Wherever your organization is in its legal ops journey, there is always an opportunity to move away from a support role to becoming a more strategic enabler.
