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4 minute read

Q2 2024 Product Update – New Features & Improvement

Shreyas Sriram

Shreyas Sriram

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    Lupl is a task management platform for lawyers that leverages AI and integrates with your existing tools to radically streamline the organization and management of legal work. Our product team works in three-week sprints, enabling us to implement impactful enhancements based on user feedback swiftly.

    In Q2, we focused on three categories of work: 1) making Lupl accessible from applications where lawyers work to reduce context switching; 2) making Lupl even easier to use; and 3) greater automation and workflow connectivity.

    Lupl is now everywhere you are – no more context-switching. 

    As a result, one of the most frequent question we get asked is: “can Lupl integrate with Outlook/Teams/ etc.?” 

    The reason is as obvious as it is valid – it’s tough to work across several applications, and the constant context-switching can disrupt even the most ardent taskmaster’s productivity and workflow. Therefore, any effort to consolidate these applications into a single context greatly benefits lawyers and their …… Teams? 👀 

    Microsoft Teams  

    Microsoft Teams is an indispensable tool in any legal team’s arsenal. Naturally, many of you have asked if we have a Teams integration. Today, the answer is yes. 

    Our new Teams app is a great way to track and manage your work in Lupl while never needing to leave Teams. Within Lupl for Teams, you can: 

    1. Create matters from scratch or using Lupl matter templates; 
    1. Create tasks from messages or channels; 
    1. Assign tasks with due dates to members of your team; and 
    1. Bring documents directly into Lupl matters with the benefit of collaborating on Teams. 

    Microsoft Copilot 

    Most legal work happens across various applications. On most days, this means seeing new emails in your inbox, messaging your colleague in Teams to get the latest status, finding the latest version in your DMS, and updating the tracker in Excel or Word. Sound familiar? 

    Many law firms are piloting or making Microsoft Copilot available to their lawyers, and Teams has become the unofficial home for Copilot. We are one of the first vendors to publish a Copilot plugin in Teams, allowing lawyers to create, manage, and get up to speed on matters using natural language.  

    With the Lupl accessible within copilot, you can: 

    1. Create matters; 
    1. Leverage templates to get started; 
    1. Get a summary of tasks and other work items that are completed and falling due; and, 
    1. Get updated on what the members of your team are currently working on. 

    With Copilot, the possibilities in Lupl are truly endless, and as Microsoft continues to enhance and improve Copilot, so too will the Lupl experience. 

    If you want to explore these additions further, contact the Lupl team to schedule a demo.

    Microsoft Outlook  

    We released the Lupl for Microsoft Outlook last year, this has been a heavily request user feature. This quarter we’ve made improvement to the performance and user experience. As a reminder with the Lupl for Outlook add-in users can: 

    1. Create and suggest tasks in Lupl matters from an email; 
    1. Assign tasks to other members of your team; and 
    1. Bring critical documents and email attachments directly into your Lupl matters. 

    Explore the Outlook add-in in action below:

    Lupl is easier to use than ever. 

    In addition to a slew of under-the-hood improvements to Lupl, we’ve made enhancements that make using Lupl even more delightful. 

    All-new Onboarding flows 

    Lupl is a large platform with many distinctive features, functionalities, and use cases. We wanted to make new users’ first experience as easy as possible.  

    Lupl now includes a brand-new onboarding journey that asks users a few basic questions. The answers are used to customize their first experience, leading to a quick time to value. 

    The re-designed Loop 

    The new Lupl homepage to give you key information as a bird's eye view

    Having a bird’s-eye view or a dashboard is helpful when tracking and managing your work across multiple matters. It’s even more imperative for senior lawyers and team leaders to oversee their team’s activity and overall progress. 

    We have designed the new Loop completely from scratch. Today, the Loop is a comprehensive dashboard where you can see: 

    1. Active matters you’re involved in, allowing you to jump back to where you last left off; 
    1. The workload of your team members, with quick access to matters and tasks they are assigned; and, 
    1. Quick view of upcoming and overdue tasks to manage deadlines with ease. 

    Create Workstreams from Excel trackers 

    We focus heavily on change management and work closely with our customers on adoption efforts. Most lawyers have existing checklists or trackers that sit as static documents in Excel.  

    Users can now simply drag-and-drop their Excel trackers into Lupl and create a new Workflow in seconds. This allows users to hit the ground running with little change to their process and breathes life into the once-static trackers.  

    Greater automation and connection of workflows

    Lupl supports more complex matters, so workflow automation is necessary to support these scenarios. Our customers want workflow automation to provide operational efficiencies and make the lives of their lawyers easier.  

    Additionally, all this must be done by ensuring integrations and support for the tools they use across the firm, such as Practice and Document Management Systems. We already have API endpoints to automate actions from Practice Management Systems (such as Intapp or Elite), and this release wanted to focus on user-side automations. 

    Relative Dates 

    Users can now build date dependencies across tasks and items in Workstream with Relative Dates. With relative dates, you can now link two or more workstream items together and have their dates be relative to the reference item.  

    For example, you can create a link between the due date of post-hearing tasks and the hearing date. This means that if the hearing date is changed, all post-hearing due dates will automatically be updated, meaning less manual admin around modifying dates. 

    Reporting from Lupl to PowerBI and other analytics tools 

    As firms leverage Lupl, they want finer control on user and matter-level reporting. Lupl provides usage information, and our platform has Admin tools to provide detailed information on users and matters. However, for firms, Lupl is often just one source of information.  

    Lupl now supports export to tools like PowerBI, which allows firms to build custom reports, dashboards, and views (e.g., Gantt charts) so users can visualize data for matter type jurisdictions, clients, and more.  

    Wider support for DMS  

    Last quarter, we shared our support for our iManage Cloud, which introduced a new way of accessing the Document Management System within Lupl.  

    We have extended this to support iManage on-prem deployment, NetDocuments, and SharePoint.  As with the iManage Cloud integration, SharePoint, NetDocs, and iManage on-Prem users can perform all their native DMS operations straight from within Lupl (one less window to juggle!). 

    Want to dive deeper? Book a personalized demo with our team to get a detailed walkthrough.

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      # Lupl Workstream Design Principles: A Practical Guide to Legal Project Management for Lawyers Legal project management works when your setup is simple, ownership is clear, and statuses are unambiguous. This guide shows how to turn existing processes and checklists into a lean, reliable Workstream. Lupl is the legal project management platform for law firms, making it easy and intuitive to apply these principles. It also supports moving your work from Excel, Word tables, or if you are transitioning from Microsoft Planner, Smartsheet, or Monday. You will learn what belongs in a Workstream, a Task, or a Step, and which columns to use. If you want practical project management for lawyers, start here. **Excerpt:** Legal project management works when ownership, dates, and statuses are clear. This guide shows lawyers how to turn checklists into Lupl Workstreams with the right columns, Tasks, and Steps. Use it to standardize project management for lawyers, reduce follow ups, and move matters to done. --- ## How to organize your work with Workstreams, Tasks, and Steps Workstreams, Tasks, and Steps are three different types of objects in Lupl. They form a simple hierarchy. Workstreams contain Tasks. Tasks may contain optional Steps. This hierarchy aligns with standard project management. In project management, you break work into projects, deliverables, and subtasks. Lupl adapts this for lawyers by using Workstreams, Tasks, and Steps. This makes it easier to map legal processes to a structure that teams can track and manage. * **Workstream.** Use when you have many similar or related items to track over time. Think of the Workstream as the table. * Examples: closing checklist, court deadlines, pretrial preparation, regulatory obligations, due diligence, local counsel management. * **Task.** A high level unit of legal work. A key deliverable with an owner and a due date. Tasks are the rows. * Examples: File motion. Prepare Shareholder Agreement. Submit Q3 report. * **Step.** An optional short checklist inside a single Task. Steps roll up to the parent Task. * Examples: Draft. QC. Partner review. E file. Serve. ### Quick test * If it can be overdue by itself, make it a Task. * If it only helps complete a Task, make it a Step. * If you need different columns or owners, create a separate Workstream. --- ## Do you need to track everything in Lupl Not every detail needs to be tracked in a project management system. The principle is to capture what drives accountability and progress. In Lupl, that means focusing on deliverables, not every micro action. * Use the level of detail you would bring to a weekly team meeting agenda. * Position Tasks as key deliverables. Treat Steps as optional micro tasks to show progress. * Example: You need client instructions. Do not add a Task for "Email client to request a call." Just make the call. If the client approves a key deliverable on the call, mark that item Approved in Lupl so the team has visibility. --- ## Start with the Core 5 columns Columns are the backbone of a Workstream. They define what information is tracked for each Task. In project management terms, these are your core metadata fields. They keep everyone aligned without overcomplicating the table. Keep the table narrow. You can add later. These five work across most legal project management use cases. 1. **Title.** Start with a verb. Example: File answer to complaint. 2. **Status.** Five to seven clear choices. Example: Not started, In progress, For review, For approval, Done. 3. **Assignee.** One named owner per row. If you add multiple assignees for collaboration, still name a primary owner. 4. **Due date.** One date per row. 5. **Type or Category.** Show different kinds of work in one table. Example: Filing, Discovery, Signature, Approval. **Priority.** Add only if you actively triage by priority each week. If added, keep it simple: High, Medium, Low. --- ## Add up to three Helper columns Lupl includes a set of pre made columns you can use out of the box. These allow you to customize Workstreams around different phases or stages of a matter. They also let you map how you already track transactional work, litigation, or other processes. Helper columns are optional fields that add context. In task management, these are similar to tags or attributes you use to sort and filter work. The key is to only add what you will update and use. Pick only what you will use. Stop when you reach three. * Party or Counterparty * Jurisdiction or Court * Phase * Approver * Approval, status or yes or no * Signature status * Risk, RAG * Amount or Number * External ID or Client ID * Document or Link * Docket number * Client entity **Guidance** * For Task Workstreams, prefer Approver, Approval, Risk. The rest are more common in Custom Workstreams. * Aim for eight columns or fewer in your main table. Put detail in the Task description, attachments, or Steps. --- ## Simple rules that keep your table clean Consistency is critical in project management. A cluttered or inconsistent table slows teams down. These rules ensure your Workstream remains usable and clear. * Only add a column people will update during the matter. If it never changes, set a default at the Workstream level or set a default value in the column. * Only add a column you will sort or filter on. If you will not use it to find or group work, leave it out. * If a value changes inside one Task, use Steps. Steps show progress without widening the table. * Keep columns short and structured. Use Description for brief context or instructions. Use Task comments for discussion and decisions. Link to work product in your DMS as the source of truth. * One accountable owner per Task and one due date. You can add collaborators, but always name a primary owner who moves the Task. If different people or dates apply to different parts, split into separate Tasks or capture the handoff as Steps. * Add automations after you lock the design. Finalize columns and status definitions first. Then add simple reminders and escalations that read those fields. --- ## Status hygiene that everyone understands Status is the single most important column in project management. It tells the team where the work stands. Too many options cause confusion. Too few cause misalignment. In Lupl, keep it simple and consistent. * Five to seven statuses are enough. * Use one review gate, For review or For approval. Use both only if your process needs two gates. * One terminal status, Done. This is the end state of the Task. Use Archived only if you report on it or need it for retention workflows. --- ## When to split into multiple Workstreams In project management, it is best practice to separate workstreams when workflows, owners, or audiences diverge. Lupl makes this easy by letting you create multiple Workstreams for one matter. Create a new Workstream if any of the following are true. * You need a different set of columns for a chunk of work. * Ownership or cadence is different, for example daily docketing vs monthly reporting. * The audience or confidentiality needs are different. **Signal** * If half your rows leave several columns blank, you are mixing processes. Split the table. --- ## Decision tree, three quick questions Use this quick framework to decide where an item belongs. This is the same principle used in task management software, adapted for legal workflows. 1. Is this a list of similar items over time, or a discrete phase of the matter * Yes. Create a Workstream. 2. Can it be overdue by itself, and does it need an owner * Yes. Create a Task. 3. Is it a step to finish a Task and not tracked on its own * Yes. Create a Step. --- ## Common mistakes to avoid Many project management failures come from overdesigning or misusing the structure. Avoid these mistakes to keep your Workstreams lean and effective. * Wide tables with many optional columns. Keep it to eight or fewer. * Two columns for the same idea, for example Status and Phase that overlap. Merge or define clearly. * More than one approval gate when one would do. It slows work and confuses owners. * Mixing unrelated processes in one table, for example signatures and invoice approvals. --- ## Build your first Workstream Building a Workstream is like setting up a project board. Keep it light, pilot it, then refine. Lupl is designed to let you do this quickly without heavy admin work. 1. Write the Workstream purpose in one sentence. 2. Add the Core 5 columns. 3. Add at most three Helpers you will use. 4. Define clear Status meanings in plain words. 5. Set defaults for any value that repeats on most rows, for example Jurisdiction. 6. Add two light automations, a due soon reminder and an overdue nudge. 7. Pilot for one week and adjust. --- ## Where this fits in legal project management Use these principles to standardize project management for lawyers across matters. Keep structures consistent. Reuse column sets and status definitions. Your team will find work faster, reduce follow ups, and close loops on time. --- ### On page SEO helpers * Suggested title tag. Lupl Workstream Design Principles, Practical Legal Project Management for Lawyers * Suggested meta description. Learn how to design lean Lupl Workstreams for legal project management. Get clear rules for Tasks, Steps, statuses, and columns to run matters with confidence. * Suggested URL slug. legal-project-management-for-lawyers-workstream-design

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