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Ironing clothes is cathartic. Watching the steam escape from the iron while the iron smooths over the wrinkles making those wrinkles disappear is amazingly satisfying. Not to make everything about legal operations or legal process improvement, but...

Many people have been speculating about whether AI tools will eliminate jobs or wipe out humanity. All this speculation reminds me of my experience with a technology tool that I thought would put me out of business a few years ago. At the time, I had...

May 29, 2023 “Hey, wasn’t the piano there when I left?” I asked that question when I walked past the dining room. I quickly followed with, “Weren’t those shelves in the bedroom?” My wife sent me to the grocery...

The soft skills that make a great mediator are the same soft skills that make a great legal operations leader. These are just some of the overlapping skills.

May 26, 2025 Skadden recently announced that it wants lawyers in the office at least four days a week. I am not privy to Skadden’s financials or the current firm culture, but I know the hybrid work model is nothing new for lawyers and...

Have you ever heard a lawyer in a moment of exasperation utter the phrase “I didn’t go to law school to…” and then add something at the end of the sentence? Here is a brief list of things I have heard lawyers say (and said...

Almost three weeks ago, the legendary Liz Ryan issued a “TEN WORD COACHING EXERCISE CHALLENGE” on LinkedIn. The challenge was: “In ten words or fewer, what’s your greatest professional accomplishment so...

May 18, 2023 Not everything that gets measured gets managed. I just heard a story about that earlier this week. A paralegal friend recently left the small law firm where she had worked for over a decade. I reached out to her when I saw on LinkedIn...

There are always better ways. That truism proved to be accurate last weekend. On Saturday, my wife and I traveled three hours to help our younger child pack and bring things back home after their second year of college. Our packing system was...

Jeff Kruse Jan. 18, 2023 I did something on January 5 this year that I dread doing.  I removed the holiday decorations from our yard. I have to do this task every year, but I never look forward to doing it.   Our yard is a focal...

Jeff Kruse Nov. 3, 2022 Continuous Active Learning (CAL) is a phrase used to describe software tools used in electronic discovery document review in litigation. A key feature of CAL is that the tool is continuously “learning” based...

Jeff Kruse Nov. 3, 2022 True leaders lead others to leadership positions. If you are not promoting from within your organization, you might want to look closely at whether your leaders are leading others to become leaders. Not everyone is...