Company Background
DLA Piper is a Multi-Billion Dollar global law firm. It employs over 3600 lawyers in more than 40 countries throughout the Americas, Europe, the Middle East, Africa, and Asia Pacific, positioning them to help clients with their legal needs worldwide.
In late December 2021, DLA started a restructure of its Billing department. Previously, there were four regions in the US, and four regional supervisors that supervised those regions. As they continued to grow, the firm decided it was necessary to have someone with more of a managerial skill set in that role rather than a supervisory skill set. At that time, the firm decided to either promote the supervisors into that role where there was interest or open up the requisitions for permanent regional managers. Recently, DLA filled a crucial Regional Manager position. It was an ongoing struggle to fill those roles, along with trying to backfill quite a few Billers.
The Need for Temp Staffing Solutions
There are three key areas that justified the need for temp Billing Specialists;
- Growth and redistribution have split the West Coast into two regions.
- They were going live with a new billing software– Aderant Sept 1st.
- End-of-year where things pick up significantly.
Because of this gap in the department, DLA determined that they needed a different caliber of temporary employees, prompting them to move forward with Naviga’s Temp Staffing Solutions. In addition, they required Naviga’s assistance locating candidates with legal experience with one of the major software platforms, either Aderant or Elite.
“I feel as though the temp to perm model is great because we get the candidates right in the door, and if they’re progressing at the level that we expect, then we can make the pitch for a Full-Time Employee role.” Louis Marani, Senior Manager of Billing Operations.
Naviga’s Process
Naviga consulted with Louis through a Zoom meeting where they calibrated on the details of the position. Although DLA had a good idea of what they were looking for, they needed a little direction. Through Naviga’s market research, we guided them on the type of billing candidates that were in the market for temporary positions.
Naviga’s team of sourcers, recruiters, and the assigned account manager quickly got to work on identifying potential candidates for these roles. In the first week, we submitted 5 candidates and Luis jumped on interviewing them in order to streamline their process quickly.
“Everyone that was submitted from the beginning had the qualifications that we were looking for, so we were able to really jump on those with medium to large law firm experience. All of the candidates had either Elite or Aderant experience, and some of those candidates actually have both!” says Louis. The dual knowledge that some of our candidates had was a surprising and pleasant welcome for the firm.
Impact of Using Naviga for Temp Staffing Solutions
Louis felt that the communication from Naviga was excellent. He particularly liked the submittal form that provides a detailed overview of the candidate’s experience and recruiter evaluation.
“Highlighting the candidate, their location, experience, and the current salary was very helpful. Obviously, we looked at the resume as well, but just having that as a snapshot was extremely helpful.”
During DLA’s review of the submitted candidates, they noticed that some of the candidates for billing also had analytical backgrounds. Louis and his team referred those candidates to the administrative side of the business to see if there was interest. That was an unexpected bonus!
“The contract role is a win-win for the firm because it allows us to bring in candidates sooner. Otherwise, we’d have to wait for multiple channels of approval, and that may take a few months.”
Conclusion:
Overall, DLA’s experience working with Naviga has been extremely positive! This year, Naviga placed 13 temps over three departments, with an average fill time of fewer than two weeks.
“So far, so good. Our goal was to stack up before we hit the Q4 process. We’re really getting there, so I’m very happy.” – Louis Marani, Senior Manager of Billing Operations.
