It’s an all-too familiar scenario in law today: You’ve got a ton of client work, but your inbox is overflowing and your task list is scattered across multiple documents and DMs.
The fact is that lawyers who work long hours can find that much of their day goes to non-billable work like project management, especially when using general-use tools that weren’t built with legal workflows in mind.
The result: burnout, rising stress levels, and constant pressure to meet demands at scale.
But it doesn’t have to be this way. Law firm workflow tools can take busy legal teams from scattered to streamlined, helping them keep pace while growing and, ultimately, serve their clients better.
Here, learn about the benefits of legal workflow management software and how it can help transform your operations. No more communication breakdowns, missed deadlines, or fire drills.+
Why legal workflow management is so important today
Generic project management tools often fall short in legal-specific use cases, creating stress for busy teams. For example, last-minute scrambles may occur when legal professionals lack access to a unified task tracker.
Recent studies show the extent of the issue: According to Bloomberg Law’s 2025 Workload & Hours Survey, attorneys reported feeling burnout on the job nearly half the time (42%).
Because the current legal services market demands a higher level of management and efficiency on matters than ever before, it’s becoming clear to a growing number of firms that now is the time to improve workflows by upgrading to a legal project management software that’s built specifically for legal team collaboration.
“Lawyers are handling some of the most sophisticated projects in the world, but they’re managing these projects with Microsoft Word checklists, sticky notes, and their minds,” said Mat Rotenberg, director of workflow solutions at Bloomberg Law.
He pointed out that while legal professionals are currently relying on outdated tools that have gone unchanged for more than a decade, their clients are using “incredibly powerful” project management tools.
Problems with general project management tools include duplicative data entry, difficulty finding the latest document version, overlooked emails, and having to use disparate tools while trying to work within a single workflow.
On top of that, general tools such as Asana and Monday feature various buttons and widgets that aren’t relevant to legal professionals’ day-to-day work.
In comparison, legal workflow management software helps legal professionals tackle high-level and complex legal tasks with ease.
Legal project management software (LPM) – including Bloomberg Law’s Dashboard Legal, which Rotenberg founded in 2020 and Bloomberg Law acquired in 2024 – is set apart because it applies core project management principles to legal service delivery.
“We saw that this particular space – the workflow space, the process space – was being ignored and decided to do something about it,” Rotenberg said.
What is legal workflow management software?
Legal workflow management software is a specialized tool that helps legal professionals streamline and optimize their legal workflows. These tools have emerged in the field of law as a response to unprecedented financial and budget pressures from clients.
To help legal professionals overcome these challenges, Bloomberg Law’s Dashboard Legal provides visibility into task assignments and their status, and users can collaborate with team members in real time by using embedded chat functionality – all within a secure, centralized platform.
This legal workflow solution isn’t about overhauling existing systems but enhancing the tools and processes that already work well for legal teams.
For instance, Dashboard Legal integrates with platforms such as iManage and NetDocuments, delivering a streamlined legal workflow that’s consolidated in one place. And because you have everything in one view – instead of spread across different email messages and platforms – you and your team can work more efficiently at each phase of the legal project management process.
Legal project management software is designed to help ensure that attorneys deliver value to their clients as efficiently as possible. In short, law firm workflow tools like Dashboard Legal exist to help legal professionals solve their everyday problems with speed and efficiency.
[Discover how Dashboard Legal can help your team stay organized, collaborate seamlessly, and deliver better client service. Request a demo.]
Streamlining case management from start to finish
These days, case management is a major (and often tedious) part of legal professionals’ day-to-day work. So, a tool that can streamline case management from start to finish is one that can provide real value for busy legal teams.
Here are some key benefits that Dashboard Legal can deliver:
- Task and deadline tracking. Access to-dos and critical dates for every matter in one place, and benefit from reminders and status updates (with no need to manually update spreadsheets).
- Document organization. Store or link to relevant documents (such as pleadings, contracts, emails) in context – and often with version control.
- Collaboration and communication. Leverage the in-platform chat or comment functions, assign tasks to colleagues, and receive notifications when something changes (thereby reducing reliance on long email threads). Also gain clear visibility into task assignments and their status instead of searching through emails for updates or querying colleagues.
- Workflow automation. Automate routine steps or checklists. For example, when a matter moves to a new stage in your workflow, automatically generate a task list or send notifications.
- Integration with existing tools. Connect this software with your email and calendars (such as Outlook), document management systems (such as iManage or NetDocs), and even billing systems, so data flows easily and without double entry.
“Dashboard Legal helps lawyers get organized and collaborate in ways that are more robust than email,” said Rotenberg. “We’re also the only project management solution specifically tailored to attorney workflows.”
A single source of truth for everything legal teams do
Despite the influx of workplace technology in recent years, email remains the go-to for many lawyers managing client work. In fact, 77% of attorneys said they used email as the primary tool for this work, according to a survey by Dashboard Legal.
But a growing number of legal leaders are realizing the demand for more streamlined law firm workflow tools. As workloads increase, such legal workflow management software can improve how teams handle administrative matters and case management vs. workflow responsibilities.
Consider a common project management workflow:
- Planning, which includes defining the project scope and desired outcomes and aligning stakeholders such as paralegals and client representatives.
- Execution, when the focus shifts to meeting project objectives and managing any inefficiencies such as inconsistent time tracking, poor version control, and fragmented communication.
- Monitoring, which combines data tracking and risk management to ensure project success.
- Closure, which ideally benefits from a structured approach that allows for the opportunity to capture stakeholder feedback, lessons learned, and the ability to document project deliverables and performance.
Of course, legal workflows have some variation. But without strong tracking and reporting systems, collecting timely updates can be time-consuming and prone to delays and errors.
Siloed team structures and communication via disparate systems can disrupt legal team collaboration and reduce transparency, which can make it more difficult to achieve project alignment.
But when you use centralized legal project management software – and gain a single source of truth for your entire project workflow – misalignment, missed deadlines, and overlooked tasks become far less likely.
Meanwhile, better communication and legal team collaboration become more likely, allowing legal professionals to avoid client dissatisfaction and reduce risk.
Enhancing collaboration for better client service
When using general email tools, attorneys and their clients can find themselves wasting time searching for updates, files, and notes.
But with Dashboard Legal, you know where to find everything and how to confirm deadlines and project assignments. The platform gives you visibility into what your colleagues are doing (reducing follow-up messaging) and confirms how your work fits into the big picture (reducing your stress and increasing efficiency).
You also can selectively share progress with your clients to build transparency and trust in your process.
For law firms, the outcome of using our legal workflow management tool could be to position themselves for increased revenue. As you improve client satisfaction, you also can differentiate yourself from competitors and receive more repeat business and referrals.
Tech solutions to common workflow problems
[Don’t let inefficiencies slow you down. Request a demo of Dashboard Legal and take control of your legal workflow management.]
Key features to look for in a legal workflow software solution
There are obvious must-have features within productivity tools for lawyers and automation in other areas of the legal field, such as for drafting, brief analysis, and docket searches. But some law firms struggle to know what to look for in legal workflow management software – especially because the technology is still relatively new.
So how do you choose the best legal project management software for your needs? Consider whether the tool offers the following features:
- Workstream or case-centric dashboards. The solution should provide clear, dashboard-based overviews of matters – and should serve as a centralized source of truth so you can manage your work in one place.
- Deadline and calendar integration. The tool should easily integrate with your existing calendars. A project dashboard with a calendar, reminders, and task assignments can help visualize timelines and dependencies to ensure tasks are completed on schedule.
- Email integration. Software also should easily integrate with your existing email platform for enhanced legal team collaboration, client communication, task organization, and progress tracking.
- Document management compatibility. An effective software solution should dovetail with existing apps and reduce the need for constant switching platforms to access documents and context. It should track document versions and changes with features like version control, and it should leverage templates to minimize redundant efforts.
- Collaboration tools. Your chosen tool also should include features that enable direct communication and task delegation, such as contextual notes and real-time legal team communication tools like embedded chats within each dashboard.
- Analytics and reporting. The tool should have dedicated and thoughtfully managed frameworks for analytics and reporting for metrics such as task completion rates and budget adherence, because post-project reviews powered by data analytics help legal teams identify lessons learned, improve processes, and uncover cost-saving opportunities.
- Security and permissions. Email is a common target of cyber attacks and can be a source of stress when it comes to run-of-the mill risks like erroneous attachments or mistaken reply-alls. Your tool should protect against these security risks and have clearly defined permissions for project access and review.
- User adoption. Choosing a user-friendly solution that’s easy to navigate can help reduce turnover and stress related to technology frustrations.
- Overall project legal management. Your chosen tool should be designed for the legal profession and cater to diverse legal matters so you can reduce the risk of missing deadlines or overlooking vital details.
See why legal teams are choosing Dashboard Legal
According to a Dashboard Legal survey, law firms’ top motivators for tech investment include the need for remote access to client files (45%), automation of manual tasks (42%), maintaining consistent quality of work (41%), and leveraging technology to reduce non-billable work (41%).
Dashboard Legal was built to help legal teams achieve these goals with repeatable success. It can be implemented in minutes, configured within days, and hosted in a private or managed public cloud. And while rollout is quick, the benefits are long-lasting.
When firms invest in our best-in-class platform, they reduce administrative burden, decrease dependence on email, minimize project risk, improve task tracking, and increase billable work.
Case study: How one law firm transformed efficiency and collaboration with Dashboard Legal
Cassiday Schade LLP, a law firm with seven offices across the Midwest, faced pressing challenges in maintaining efficiency and fostering collaboration in a hybrid work setting.
Traditional project management tasks like following lengthy Outlook threads and tracking internal memoranda felt disjointed, and email chains lacked the clarity and immediacy that modern legal practices demand.
Jimmy Maruna, a partner in the Chicago office, chose Dashboard Legal with a goal to modernize workflows and meet evolving client demands while streamlining team operations. He launched a pilot program that became a quick success, leading to the platform implementation across all seven offices.
The results so far? Dashboard Legal’s task list functionality and centralized communication have streamlined daily workflows, reduced downtime, and simplified onboarding, enabling the team to work smarter and faster. It has also improved learning among younger attorneys.
“Every day, I can go into the platform and see what’s due today, what’s due tomorrow, and then I can adjust my day around it,” Maruna said. “Because we can upload documents directly from our DMS system, we can improve review and analysis of documents while still maintaining robust security.”
Hear from Jimmy Maruna, a partner at Cassiday Schade, about why they purchased Dashboard Legal and the improvements it’s made to their collaboration, communication, and client service. [4:29]
A new era of efficiency and collaboration across legal departments
Fears about matter management are real. In fact, four out of five lawyers surveyed by Dashboard Legal said they were afraid of things slipping through the cracks.
But here’s the good news: Bloomberg Law Dashboard Legal helps busy teams avoid the downsides of siloed systems.
“It organizes lawyers, matters, their tasks, their emails, and documents into structured and visual workplace workspaces,” said Rotenberg, adding that the legal workflow management software was built on the promise of efficiency and seamless integration.
“It always comes back to, ‘Is this easy? Is it simple? Is it easy for them to start?’” said Rotenberg. “All of that is baked into our DNA.”
By streamlining workflows, improving communication, and reducing wasted resources, Bloomberg Law’s Dashboard Legal helps legal professionals meet client and stakeholder expectations.
Ready to streamline your legal workflows and become more productive and collaborative? Request a demo.