Accelerating Data Adoption to Transform How We Practice at Ropes & Gray

Impactful Adoption: It’s Not About the Tech Alone

Have you ever launched a powerful solution, like a dynamic data dashboard, only to learn it solves a problem no one knew you had? If so, you’ve likely discovered that “if you build it, they will come” rarely delivers.

Many product managers face the challenge of developing impressive solutions that ultimately fall flat. The real issue is often not the technology, but missing the mark on stakeholder engagement and product marketing. Sometimes, it’s simply a lapse in connecting with real end-users to gather feedback and encourage adoption.

Adoption challenges aren’t new in the data world. Gartner research from 2016-2017 estimated that 60-85% of BI, big data, and data science projects would fail. As recently as 2023, Gartner’s CDAO survey found that only 44% of data and analytics leaders worldwide believe their teams effectively provide real business value.

The numbers are sobering for data and analytics professionals—and they’re entirely preventable. The common thread across these findings is a failure to understand business needs and communicate effectively. By embracing close collaboration, tailored design techniques, and personalized enablement strategies, organizations can prevent adoption challenges and accelerate impact—ensuring that major projects don’t end up on the shelf.  

Overcoming Adoption Challenges: Data in Legal Services

As our analytics program matured, we noticed a significant shift: dashboards were no longer just dashboards, but had evolved into full-fledged products. What began as simple reporting interfaces grew into robust, integrated platforms tailored to the diverse workflows common in legal services. These products offered not only data visualization, but also actionable insights, embedded guidance, and seamless integration with existing technology stacks. 

This transformation was fueled by active engagement with end users. Continuous feedback from professionals across the organization informed the development of new features, strengthened security and compliance measures, and enabled the creation of specialized components to meet evolving industry standards. As a result, our solutions advanced beyond basic reporting, equipping users with actionable insights to support decision-making, streamline routine processes, and proactively address potential risks. 

By moving from static dashboards to dynamic products, we delivered lasting value and positioned our organization at the forefront of legal analytics innovation. Our approach ensured that every solution was not only adopted, but truly embedded in daily workflows, driving measurable improvements in efficiency, compliance, and client service. 

User-Driven Design: Accelerating Engagement & Value

The biggest impact came from a relentless focus on user-driven design. Before every build, we mapped user journeys and input from each key persona across business support and legal operations. Their feedback ensured each dashboard answered real questions and served its intended workflow.

Designs started with standardized templates to accelerate development and ensure consistency, but always allowed for customization to fit individual needs. Striking a balance between customization, consistency, and flexibility was a game-changer. Presenting our approach at industry conferences and collaborating with delivery partners helped refine these strategies and contributed to our success.  

Collaboration Across Teams: Creating Champions & Driving Adoption

Collaboration isn’t just a buzzword. When done right, it turns lukewarm adoption into genuine excitement. Instead of working in isolation, we intentionally partnered with power users, functional leaders, and developers to build enthusiasm, co-creating and continuously refining our solutions. 

We organized interactive, collaborative events and internal hackathons that empowered users to challenge designs, propose ideas, and offer candid feedback. Training sessions evolved into workshops where participants shaped dashboards and prioritized enhancements. 

Because top-down adoption approaches rarely succeed, we embraced a matrixed strategy, engaging stakeholders iteratively across the organization. Rather than relying solely on a rigid, linear “Research-Design-Develop-Deliver” model, we constantly sought feedback to build buy-in.  

For example, we developed customizable dashboards that allow users to tailor their experience, marking which matters are most relevant and receiving personalized reports. These selections feed into weekly communications, ensuring users receive the information most relevant to them—starting each week with meaningful insights.  

Our two-way collaboration paid off. Dashboards shaped through collaborative events achieved significantly higher adoption then traditional solutions. More users became champions and demand for next-generation analytics solutions rose across the organization. 

Technical Excellence: Securing, Scaling, and Integrating Analytics

While technology alone isn’t everything, it has proven foundational for the success of data solutions in the legal services space. Our dashboards are built on a robust analytics platform to meet the strict security and compliance standards required for sensitive data.  

The platform’s open architecture and semantic layer consolidate all our data in a single location—creating a single source of truth for the business. Row-level governance ensures only authorized users access specific information, strengthening security and trust across every solution.  

Modular embedding capabilities offered by the platform help extend data impact. Seamlessly integrating insights into billing, matter management, and client engagement workflows makes analytics more than a mere add-on—it’s at the heart of daily operations.  

Having a strong analytics platform as the foundation of our data ecosystem has been transformative. Active collaboration with technology partners empowers us to be more efficient, innovative, and responsive to client needs. 

Final Thoughts for Data & Analytics Leaders

Stay curious, stay collaborative, and always keep measuring what matters. Transforming the way an organization uses data is a journey, not a sprint. It takes empathy, technical rigor, and unwavering user focus to deliver impact.  

By listening to teams, empowering collaboration, and measuring success, we’ve built an analytics culture that’s strategic and sustainable. The proof is in the significant growth in active users, daily dashboard engagement, and weekly report subscriptions we’ve seen in recent years—true multipliers across every measure that matters.   

Our partnership with our preferred technology provider empowered us to innovate, save time, and serve clients better. Today, dashboards are indispensable for attorneys, partners, and analysts alike. Analytics have evolved from an abstract idea into a powerful, practical suite of tools driving accuracy, speed, and smarter decisions.  

Top Takeaways for Practitioners

These five principles helped drive our data adoption in complex, regulated environments:  

1. Map Personas & Use Cases: Know your people and their workflows. Design solutions to solve practical, role-specific problems—not just abstract needs. 

2. Cultivate Champions & Collaboration: Partner with power users and practice leaders, incorporate input through feedback loops, and encourage co-design for every solution. 

3. Design Solutions & Training to Evolve: Build interactive hubs, run hands-on workshops, and update resources to reflect real feedback and impact metrics. 

4. Insist on Integration & Security: Anchor solutions in robust, compliant platforms that securely integrate data across various sources to grow alongside business needs. 

5. Track & Celebrate Outcomes: Monitor engagement and quantify real-world impact—highlighting team contributions builds momentum and reinforces the power of teamwork. 

Customer Stories That Inspire

Each year, dozens of customers share their success at Strategy World—our annual user conference for Strategy practitioners and data enthusiasts. Experience World 2025 on-demand to learn more from data analytics leaders like Ritika Mehan from Ropes & Gray.  

Want to connect live? Register for Strategy World 2026 today to hear our latest customer stories live in Las Vegas from February 23-26, 2026. The event brings together the best in data, analytics, and AI—offering a truly engaging learning experience, like the author attests.  

"I love the multitude of opportunities Strategy World provides. The event lets us learn from and collaborate with other companies to overcome data analytics challenges. We get to explore the latest advancements of the tool, while exchanging ideas and insights that drive innovation and improvement in our own use of the platform—it’s a great place to learn and evolve."

— Ritika Mehan, Manager of Strategy Solutions, Ropes & Gray