From Cost Center to Profit Protector: ROI Lessons for In-House Counsel

By Ellen Traweek, LexisNexis.

For years, corporate legal departments have faced the same tough reality: rising workloads, constrained budgets and constant pressure to deliver more value to the business. While other functions, like finance, marketing and IT have grown adept at measuring their return on investment (ROI), legal has struggled to make its value visible in numbers the C-suite can rally behind.

That’s starting to change.

A recent Forrester Consulting Total Economic Impact (TEI) Study, commissioned by LexisNexis, shows that a composite organization representative of interviewed customers with experience using Lexis+ AI achieved a 284% ROI and nearly $1 million in net present value over three years.

For in-house attorneys, the headline numbers are measurable, but the real power lies in the fact that you can now see what ROI looks like for your legal department.

Why ROI Matters More Than Ever

Legal has long been essential but misunderstood. Cost control dominates conversations, and even major wins—avoiding litigation, negotiating better terms or managing regulatory risk—rarely show up on financial dashboards. Without clear numbers, legal departments often end up under-resourced or left behind when technology budgets are allocated.

The TEI study flips that narrative by proving what many in-house lawyers already know: legal can deliver measurable, quantifiable business value when equipped with the right tools.

Here’s what the study found:

• Up to 13% reduction in outside counsel reliance, saving more than $600,000 in avoided fees.
• 25%-time savings for attorneys handling legal inquiries, worth over $574,000 in capacity gains.
• 50%-time savings for paralegals on summarization and analysis, valued at more than $53,000.

Put together, these improvements paid for themselves in under six months.

But here’s the real opportunity: your department’s numbers will be unique. Your outside counsel spend, caseload and staffing mix create a different financial picture. And for the first time, you can get a tailored view of what legal AI means for your bottom line.

From Cost Center to Strategic Partner

ROI is more than a budgeting metric—it’s a mindset shift. When legal can show that every dollar invested in AI returns nearly three dollars in value, it changes the conversation with senior leadership. You’re no longer making the case for “better tools.” You’re making the case for legal as a strategic driver of efficiency, agility and capacity.

One operations leader interviewed in the study described it well: ‘[We want to increase our attorneys’ capacity to take on more work in-house,] and the answer isn’t work harder and longer—it’s work more efficiently and work smarter. We feel that Lexis+ AI, in addition to some other efficiency measures that we put in place, has allowed us to take on that additional intake.’ – AVP, Staff Counsel Operations, Insurance

That’s the kind of language the C-suite understands.

The Human Side of ROI

Behind the numbers are benefits that resonate on a personal level:

• Faster answers for the business. Internal clients don’t just get responses, they get them sooner, with more context and accuracy.
• Reduced burnout. Attorneys and paralegals can spend less time on rote, time-draining work and more on strategic or fulfilling projects.
• Stronger recruitment and retention. Giving your team cutting-edge tools isn’t just about productivity, it’s about making legal an attractive, future-ready place to work.

When you add up these factors, ROI becomes more than a metric. It becomes a story of a department that is more effective, more engaged and more strategically aligned with the business.

The Call to In-House Counsel: See Your ROI

The Forrester TEI study provides a rigorous, independent analysis of the economic benefits of Lexis+ AI. But the real breakthrough comes when you apply the framework to your own legal department.

What would it mean to reduce outside counsel spend by double digits? To give attorneys back a quarter of their time? To free paralegals from half their administrative tasks?

You don’t have to guess.

Download the Total Economic Impact of Lexis+ AI Study to see the full findings.

And when you do, you’ll have the opportunity to go a step further: get a personalized ROI assessment that shows what AI-driven transformation could mean for your specific team, your budget and your business.

For years, legal has struggled to prove its economic impact. With Lexis+ AI, you can finally do more than tell the story – you can show it.

—

About the author: Ellen Traweek is Marketing Manager at LexisNexis in the USA.

[ This is a sponsored thought leadership article for AL by LexisNexis. ]