Case study
Pascua Yaqui Tribe transforms legal matter management with HighQ
With Thomson Reuters HighQ, the Attorney General’s office streamlined intake, centralized documents, automated tasks, and improved matter oversight for faster service to 20,000 members
Introduction
The Pascua Yaqui Tribe of Arizona is transforming the way legal matters are handled on behalf of its 20,000 tribal members. The Office of the Attorney General represents all the tribal government’s departments—including the Indian Child Welfare Act (ICWA) unit—on legal matters and cases heard in the state courts. It has adopted Thomson Reuters HighQ, the modern, adaptable legal operations and business management software solution that simplifies legal processes. In doing so, it has successfully streamlined case intake, enhanced document organization, automated routine tasks, and improved matter oversight.
“Another tribe demonstrated the structural components of HighQ to us, and it related really well to the way our department operates in terms of what we could do to improve legal request intake and document management,” says O.J. Flores, Attorney General for the Pascua Yaqui tribe. “It just made a lot of sense for us to go with HighQ.”
20,000
tribal members served by Attorney General’s office
100
contract types automated annually with HighQ
1
centralized portal for all legal matters
The Power of a Centralized Portal
Prior to deploying HighQ, legal processes were very paper based, with a complex case numbering and categorization system stored in an Excel® spreadsheet, along with lots of boxes of files and folders.
Now, client departments can submit new legal matter (or “legal review”) requests and upload documents directly to the legal team through a dedicated HighQ intake portal. In this portal, folders are automatically created for each specific matter or project so that all necessary documents such as correspondence, contracts, court orders, motions, or pleadings are housed centrally in one place in a well-organized fashion.
At each stage of the process, both the client department and the relevant attorney assigned to the case receive notifications about status and next steps. Importantly, permissions can be established in HighQ so that only specific people can access folders within the portal, ensuring that confidential information is safeguarded.
“The automated folder creation is one of my favorite features. Everything is automated in the legal review request and communication process, except for the lawyer review piece itself,” says Flores.
When a new matter comes in, a folder is established in a Microsoft 'My Documents'-style structure, which is very familiar to staff. The only thing they must do is open the folder and start work. “I know a lot of people are very pleased with the Word edit features, which make it easy for them to do their work right there in the portal. They don’t have to save, download, or upload documents anywhere else.”
Flores also finds the visibility the portal provides invaluable from a supervisory perspective. At any given moment, he can open HighQ and see how many files or projects a member of staff is working on, as well as how quickly they are turning matters around and getting completed work back to client departments. He and his team use the app for remote access, and individuals also have their own customizable dashboards to stay on top of their cases.
“We’ve got numerous clients in huge departments that operate with different managers in different divisions. If they run into me anywhere, and they ask me, ‘Do you know the status of this legal request I submitted?’ I can easily pull it up and tell them,” he says. “Being able to effectively respond to our clients at any time is invaluable. It also provides accountability for our department.”
The Benefits of Document Automation
The Pascua Yaqui Tribe’s Office of the Attorney General is also deploying the Document Automation functionality in HighQ to allow standard documents, such as procurement contracts, to be automatically generated from templates.
Flores explains that around 100 different contract types are negotiated and entered into every year. “Our objective with Document Automation is to create these standard output contracts, where all the client department has to do is enter in just a couple of fields with the essential details such as contract start and end dates, the parties’ addresses, dollar amounts, and any specific, individual terms,” he says. “Then they get a pre-approved contract that doesn’t require legal review, so they can get those projects underway. So, we have more efficient government operations.”
In addition to the efficiency gains, Document Automation also improves consistency and helps preserve internal legal knowledge management. For Flores, implementing Document Automation forces the legal department to standardize its forms, which has been one of his priorities since becoming Attorney General. “I think it's also very important for maintaining continuity of our institutional knowledge, so you don’t lose that know-how or best practices through staff turnover,” he adds.
“By having everything stored centrally, including our institutional knowledge, we can elevate our operations and our legal practice.”
O.J. Flores
Attorney General, Pascua Yaqui tribe
Easy Implementation
The fact that HighQ operates in a familiar environment that is based on the Microsoft operating system and can plug into Microsoft Outlook was very reassuring from a user adoption perspective.
“People are creatures of habit, and for individuals who are used to Windows and organizing their case files in a certain way, we found HighQ very easy to implement and get staff to use.”
O.J. Flores
Attorney General, Pascua Yaqui tribe
“And then there are just so many cool features in HighQ that make things a lot more user-friendly and easier to access what you need.”
The implementation process for HighQ went very smoothly, and Flores and his team valued the support Thomson Reuters provided along the way. He says, “There was a lot of one-on-one work with representatives from HighQ to ensure it worked in the specific way that we wanted it to and that it would deliver our desired outcomes. Ultimately, it’s working very well for us.”
At a glance
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Tucson, Arizona
Solutions
HighQ
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