Early Case Assessment Pays Off for Royal Dutch Shell
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Since launching its dedicated litigation department in 2012, energy giant Royal Dutch Shell has reduced its annual litigation caseload by almost one third.
Sitting within Shell’s wider legal department, the 90-lawyer litigation team is headed by litigation general counsel Richard Hill. Through the group, Mr Hill has introduced an internal benchmark known as the ‘litigation objectives realisation process’ (LORP), which is designed to standardise management of Shell’s high and low-value litigation across the globe. A key feature of LORP is an early case assessment process. It aims to evaluate likely dispute outcomes and decide whether individual disputes are worth pursuing to trial or should be settled early before legal costs begin to mount.
A smart move
It appears the new strategy has borne fruit, as Shell’s litigation caseload has dropped by almost a third since the team was launched in 2012, including a 10 per cent dip in cases year-on-year in 2015 alone. Combined with robust cost-cutting measures, Shell has managed to cull its litigation spend by 20 per cent in just 12 months.
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