PILLAR Business Manager

POSITION SUMMARY 

The PILLAR Business Manager is responsible for the day-to-day operation of the Firm’s AI-enabled legal production service, managing the flow of work from intake and scoping through delivery, measurement, and follow-up. This role ensures that AI-enabled legal assignments are appropriately scoped, staffed, scheduled, documented, and integrated with the Firm’s commercial, financial, and matter-management processes.  Working at the intersection of legal practice, technology, eDiscovery, finance, and client delivery, the PILLAR Business Manager partners with attorneys, legal professionals, technologists, and business teams to establish and maintain efficient, scalable operating processes. The role requires strong operational judgment and the ability to create structure within a rapidly evolving environment while maintaining clear accountability, service standards, and appropriate attorney oversight.  The PILLAR Business Manager facilitates the operational processes supporting AI-enabled legal work but does not determine legal strategy, make final privilege decisions, validate legal conclusions, accept work product on behalf of a responsible attorney, make compensation or credit determinations, or independently establish pricing. The role is responsible for ensuring that appropriate stakeholders make required decisions and that assignments, approvals, documentation, and related processes move forward effectively. 

KEY RESPONSIBILITIES 

·       Manage the intake process for AI-enabled legal production requests, translating requests into clearly documented assignments with defined scope, intended use, source requirements, participants, timelines, dependencies, deliverables, and commercial considerations. 

·       Coordinate Legal AI Operators, Evidence Operations, case team members, validators, responsible attorneys, and other contributors throughout the assignment lifecycle while maintaining appropriate roles, responsibilities, decision rights, and attorney oversight. 

·       Manage the active portfolio of AI-enabled legal assignments, including capacity, prioritization, deadlines, dependencies, handoffs, delivery commitments, refresh requests, exceptions, and escalations. 

·       Maintain the product and assignment pipeline and provide visibility into demand, status, forecast, repeat use, adoption, delivery history, and emerging operational needs. 

·       Partner with Pricing, Finance, Billing, and matter teams to support consistent quoting, matter setup, measurement, and billing processes and ensure appropriate follow-through on required commercial and financial activities. 

·       Maintain complete and accurate operational records, including source boundaries, workflow status, validation, responsible-attorney acceptance, release, delivery, refresh, and supersession documentation. 

·       Track and analyze operational performance, including effort, cycle time, defects, remediation, variance, capacity, and lessons learned, and translate findings into improvements to products, workflows, procedures, and service delivery. 

·       Develop and maintain concise dashboards and management reporting that provide program leadership and Firm management with visibility into demand, capacity, delivery, adoption, operational performance, exceptions, and unresolved decisions. 

·       Support adoption of the Firm’s AI-enabled legal production capabilities by helping partners and case teams identify appropriate uses, understand available services, and effectively navigate intake, execution, and delivery processes. 

·       Maintain accurate participation and utilization records to support Firm reporting, program evaluation, and applicable recognition processes. 

·       Develop, document, implement, and continuously improve operating procedures, service standards, workflows, escalation paths, controls, and cross-functional responsibilities as the Legal AI program evolves and expands. 

·       Establish clear ownership, deadlines, dependencies, and status visibility across active assignments to promote accountability and timely delivery. 

·       Facilitate consistent handoffs among pricing, matter setup, production, validation, responsible-attorney acceptance, delivery, and billing processes, ensuring that required documentation is complete and appropriate stakeholders are engaged. 

·       Identify operational risks, gaps, bottlenecks, and unresolved decisions and coordinate appropriate escalation and resolution. 

·       Use insights and lessons learned from completed assignments to drive measurable improvements in service delivery, procedures, training, workflows, and future AI-enabled legal products. 

REQUIRED QUALIFICATIONS 

• Bachelor’s degree or equivalent combination of education and relevant professional experience. 

• Minimum of seven years of progressively responsible experience in service operations, program management, project management, legal operations, professional services, or a comparable client-delivery environment. 

• Demonstrated ability to manage multiple complex and concurrent workstreams involving competing priorities, deadlines, interdependent teams, and senior stakeholders. 

• Strong operational judgment and demonstrated ability to clarify ambiguous requests, identify missing information or decisions, manage exceptions, resolve operational issues, and escalate matters appropriately. 

• Working knowledge of financial and operational concepts, including pricing, cost, utilization, realization, variance, forecasting, and capacity planning. 

• Demonstrated experience developing and implementing processes, maintaining reliable operational records, and using data, metrics, dashboards, and reporting to evaluate and improve service delivery. 

• Strong organizational and project-management capabilities, with demonstrated attention to detail and the ability to manage assignments from intake through completion. 

• Excellent written and verbal communication skills, including the ability to communicate complex operational matters clearly and concisely with partners, attorneys, technologists, business professionals, and Firm leadership. 

• Demonstrated ability to collaborate effectively across legal, technical, financial, and operational functions while maintaining clear roles, responsibilities, and decision-making authority. 

• High level of discretion, professionalism, and sound judgment in handling confidential client, personnel, financial, and Firm information. 

• Ability to operate effectively in a rapidly evolving environment, establish structure where processes are still developing, and adapt operating practices as business and technology requirements change. 

PREFERRED QUALIFICATIONS 

• Experience working within an AmLaw law firm, corporate legal department, eDiscovery organization, litigation support function, legal technology company, or technology-enabled professional services environment. 

• Experience launching, operationalizing, standardizing, or scaling a new service, product line, innovation program, technology-enabled offering, or center of excellence. 

• Familiarity with litigation, investigation, discovery, and legal-production workflows, including legal work product, attorney supervision, validation, privilege considerations, and the responsible use of artificial intelligence. 

• Experience supporting AI-enabled, technology-enabled, or data-driven legal services and workflows. 

• Experience with alternative fee arrangements, product or service pricing, legal project management, matter economics, or related financial-management processes. 

• Experience developing operational dashboards, management reporting, service-level metrics, capacity models, or other tools used to measure and improve service performance. 

• Proficiency with workflow management, project-management, reporting, data visualization, and business-intelligence tools. 

• Familiarity with legal technology platforms, eDiscovery systems, matter-management systems, AI platforms, or related legal-service delivery technologies. 

• Project management, legal operations, process improvement, or comparable professional certification is preferred but not required. 

The expected salary range for this position is $245,000 - $265,000.  Final compensation will be determined based on several factors, including but not limited to, relevant experience, qualifications, skill set, and geographic location. Qualified applicants with arrest and conviction records will be considered for the position in accordance with the California Fair Chance Act.

Pillsbury Winthrop Shaw Pittman LLP is an Equal Opportunity Employer.

If you require an accommodation in order to apply for a position, please contact us at [email protected].