What to Look for in a Workflow Automation Platform for Legal Teams

Generic workflow tools promise automation, but they aren’t built for the complexity of legal work. Legal teams need more than just digital forms and task lists. They need a platform that understands legal’s needs, handles nuanced processes, and actually helps teams scale.

Now, you may be wondering: what should I look for in a workflow automation platform specifically designed for legal teams?

Let’s discuss the key capabilities and features of a workflow automation platform such as what the platform should enable your legal team to do and the software functionality that brings those to life.

Capabilities to Look For in Workflow Automation Software

The right legal workflow automation platform should fundamentally change how legal operates by delivering consistency, increasing visibility, and giving time back to high-impact work.

Streamlines Legal Requests

Legal shouldn’t be spending hours chasing down context or sorting requests in their inbox. A strong workflow automation platform enables structured, standardized legal intake so every request comes in the right way, with the right information, and flows to the right place. This reduces manual triage, speeds up response times, and eliminates ambiguity about what legal is working on and why.

Centralized Matter Tracking

Work spread across tools means no one has a clear picture of what’s going on. A strong platform consolidates everything in one place: intake, matters, tasks, documents, and status updates. That single source of truth makes it easier to prioritize, track progress, and manage team capacity with confidence.

Self-Sufficiency for Updates and Configuration

Legal teams shouldn’t have to wait weeks for IT support to build or update a workflow. A no-code platform gives legal full ownership to create, launch, and iterate on processes themselves. This ability to move quickly is crucial for scaling legal’s impact without growing headcount and without sacrificing compliance.

Cross-Functional Collaboration

Whether it’s approvals from finance, input from sales, or sign-off from leadership, collaboration is constant. Workflow automation should simplify how legal interacts with the business by automating handoffs, reminders, and updates across teams. This helps teams deliver faster turnaround times and make fewer mistakes.

Access to Actionable Insights

Leadership expects legal to deliver accurate and impactful work. And that means having data to back decisions. Some legal workflow automation tools link directly to dashboard and reporting tools which enable teams to track turnaround times, measure team workload, identify bottlenecks, and report on key metrics.

Fast Deployment and Intuitive User Experience

The best platform means nothing if your team can’t (or won’t) use it. Prioritize software solutions that are easy to implement and intuitive to navigate for both legal and business users. The faster your team can go live and self-manage, the quicker you’ll start seeing value.

Features to Look For in Workflow Automation Software

Once you know what you need your legal workflow platform to enable, the next step is knowing how it should get you there. These are the must-have features that empower legal teams to work smarter, move faster, and scale sustainably.

AI-Powered, Customizable Intake Forms

Legal work isn’t one-size-fits-all, and your intake shouldn’t be either. Look for a platform that allows you to build dynamic, logic-based forms that capture the right information upfront. For even greater efficiency, look for a platform that offers AI Chatbots embedded directly into your communication tools and intranet or that leverages AI to pre-fill, classify, or route requests based on company content so information is never missed.

Centralized Matter Dashboard 

Without visibility, you can’t manage risk or resources effectively. A centralized matter management dashboard that operates as a single source of truth gives both the legal team and stakeholders a real-time view of all incoming, ongoing, and completed matters, including status, owners, deadlines, and documentation. This kind of transparency helps prioritize work, align expectations, and eliminate unnecessary back-and-forth.

No-Code Workflow Builder

A no-code builder lets legal teams create and modify workflows on their own, complete with branching logic, conditional approvals, automated document generation, and more. No-code workflow automation platforms like Checkbox give lawyers and legal ops professionals drag-and-drop tools to be able to visually map out workflow steps and processes. This results in greater agility without having to sacrifice control.

Integrations with Business Tools

For automation to work well, it needs to meet your users where they already are. Look for a platform that integrates directly with tools your business partners use every day such as Slack, Microsoft Teams, email, and Salesforce. That way, clients can submit requests, receive updates, and take action without ever logging into a separate system. Integrations increase adoption, reduce friction, and keep legal work moving forward.

Configurable Reporting and Analytics Tools

Data is only as powerful as your ability to act on it. The right platform gives you access to customizable dashboards and exportable reports that show volume trends, turnaround times, SLA adherence, and more. This helps legal operations demonstrate ROI, surface resourcing needs, and spot opportunities for improvement.

Enterprise-Grade Security and Compliance

Legal data is highly sensitive and your platform needs to treat it that way. Ensure it offers features like role-based access controls, audit trails, encryption, and compliance with standards like SOC 2 or ISO 27001. Security can’t be a trade-off. It has to be built-in from day one.

Key Takeaways

An effective legal workflow automation platform should do more than digitize forms or send reminders. It should centralize your work, empower your team to self-serve, and deliver the data you need to make smarter decisions.

When evaluating platforms, look beyond the buzzwords. Ask yourself:

• Does this solve our problems around intake and triage?
• Can my team track every matter in one place?
• Will I have the insights to report on our impact and make resourcing decisions?

If the answer isn’t a clear yes, it’s time to reconsider.

At Checkbox, we’ve built our platform specifically for legal teams, giving you the features and flexibility to streamline operations and scale your function without compromise.

Ready to see how it works? Book a demo and take the first step toward transforming how legal gets work done.