Innovation Strategy Manager

Cooley is seeking an Innovation Strategy manager to join Cooley's Practice Innovation team.

Position summary:  As a leading technology law firm, Cooley is determined to become a leader in the digital practice of law. The Innovation Strategy Manager is responsible for managing Cooley’s new practice Innovation pipeline. This role is responsible for the product discovery, user research, and incubation process, evaluating and prioritizing innovation initiatives, and incorporating AI and emerging technologies to create a competitive advantage for Cooley’s world-leading legal practices. Cooley Innovation embraces a culture of customer service excellence, and all members of the department are expected to embody this attitude. Specific duties and responsibilities include, but are not limited to, the following:

Position responsibilities: 

• Manage the practice innovation pipeline to discover, incubate, pilot and evaluate new product opportunities that will yield the greatest benefits to the firm and its attorneys

• Leverage best practices in user research and design to deeply understand attorney and client pain points, and identify high-value opportunities to improve legal workflows

• Refine, systematize and scale the practice innovation pipeline process to promote greater efficiency, uniformity, and transparency into how product decisions are made

• Identify and evaluate practice innovation opportunities leveraging cutting-edge emerging technologies and AI advancements

• Foster strong working relationships with change management, innovation counsel and product, engineering, and other teams to evaluate products and use cases, run pilots, launch products and drive engagement

• Collaborate in cross-functional intake and prioritization across technology and operations departments

• Collaborate with the Associate Director of Practice Innovation and innovation leadership to develop and manage data-driven evaluation process to quantify the business value of practice-facing products

• Manage direct report(s) with a focus on fostering a high-performance, collaborative, innovative, and results-driven team culture

• Collaborate in the development of and adoption of unified work management practices across practice innovation to promote transparency, clarity, scalability and efficiency

• Serve as direct supervisor and mentor to direct reports

• Provide day-to-day supervision of direct reports, ensure compliance with assigned work hours and monitor for compliance with all firm and department policies. Manage staffing coverage, review and process time logs/time off requests

• Support business professional development and continued educational opportunities

• In collaboration with immediate supervisor and CN HR, participate in hiring, performance appraisals, counseling, termination and other employee lifecycle events

• All other duties as assigned or required

Skills & experience: 

Required:

• After orientation at Cooley LLP, exhibit proficiency in the Microsoft Office suite, iManage and other firm applications

• Ability to work extended and/or weekend hours, as required

• Ability to travel, as required

• 5+ years of directly applicable experience (e.g., user research, design thinking or human centered design facilitation, product discovery process, prototyping, legal technology use and adoption, quantitative evaluation). Eligible for consideration of Senior designation with 7+ years applicable experience in the field with 2+ years of exempt/management experience in relevant roles

• Experience in managing cross-functional projects involving users, product and design, knowledge management, technology and practicing lawyers or clients

Preferred:

• Bachelor’s degree, Juris Doctor(ate) or non-US equivalent

• Experience with core large law technologies such as iManage or NetDocs, Elite 3E, Intapp products, Litera products, Thomson Reuters and Lexis products

• Advanced knowledge of the workflows and the core needs of practicing lawyers

• Strong understanding of legal technology, emerging technology and AI

• Strong effective presentation experience and skills to varied audiences

• Experience with technology usage data and metrics and ability to leverage data for insights and storytelling using data visualization applications such as Power BI and Tableau

• Project management experience

• Supervisory experience

Competencies: 

• Strong focus on identifying core user and business needs and delighting users at scale

• Advanced knowledge of product process (including design thinking and human centered design methodologies), and experience in facilitating user research and journey mapping

• Strong leadership experience and ability to build, manage and mentor a team

• Excellent communication and interpersonal skills, with the ability to translate complex technical concepts to legal professionals and senior executives

• Ability to influence and collaborate with multiple stakeholders across various departments (product, engineering, change management, practicing attorneys, clients, etc.)

• Strong prioritization, project management, creative problem-solving and time management skills

• Ability to focus on detail without losing sight of bigger picture

Cooley offers a competitive compensation and excellent benefits package and is committed to fair and equitable employment practices.

EOE.

The expected annual pay range for this position with a full-time schedule is $125,000 - $190,000. Senior level candidates may be considered for this position and would be eligible for a higher salary range based on experience. Please note that final offer amount will be dependent on geographic location, applicable experience and skillset of the candidate.

We offer a full range of elective benefits including medical, health savings account (with applicable medical plan), dental, vision, health and/or dependent care flexible spending accounts, pre-tax commuter benefits, life insurance, AD&D, long-term care coverage, backup care for children and/or adults and other parental support benefits. In addition to elective benefit options, benefited employees receive firm-paid life insurance, AD&D, LTD, short term medical benefits as well as 21 days of Paid Time Off (“PTO”) and 10 paid holidays each year. We provide generous parental leave and fertility benefits. New employees will attend a detailed benefit orientation to learn more about our many benefits and resources.