Management Profiles

James Seidl

President

James Seidl co-founded Minneapolis-based Legal Research Center, Inc., in 1978 and has served as President since 1987. Legal Research Center (www.legalresearch.com) provides legal research and writing, research management, and regulatory compliance services to attorneys in corporate and private practice throughout the world. Mr. Seidl’s primary responsibilities are in the areas of business, product and service development; he is also responsible for new business planning and corporate strategic partnering.

Mr. Seidl co-produced and published the Legal Transformation Study: Your 2020 Vision of the Future (www.legaltransformation.com). The Study identifies key global trends and uncertainties shaping the future of the legal industry and creates a set of four detailed planning scenarios from these forces. The scenarios challenge current service models within the legal industry, answer key strategic questions, and enable corporate law departments and law firms to proactively identify decision-making strategies to ensure their future business success.

Mr. Seidl is former a Minnesota State Chair for the Council on Litigation Management (www.litmgmt.org). Mr. Seidl serves on the Board of the Open Legal Standards Initiative (www.openlegalstandards.org), whose mission is to establish standards for quality and efficient legal services through the development of business process and metrics classification systems. Mr. Seidl serves as business development and strategic advisor to Click Industries, Ltd. (www.clickandinc.com), Miller/Davis Company (www.millerdavis.com), Decision Strategies International (www.thinkdsi.com), and VersusLaw (www.versuslaw.com), in which LRC is a strategic and financial partner. Mr. Seidl also serves on the Managing Litigation as a Business and Managing Litigation Reference Model Advisory Board (mlrm.net/advisory-board); the Board of Directors of The Priyanka Foundation (www.thepriyankafoundation.org); and the Board of Directors of Friends of Flicka (www.flickasfriends.org), of which he is a co-founder. Mr. Seidl previously served on the board of directors of Law & Politics Media, Inc., publisher of SuperLawyers™ and the monthly Minnesota Law & Politics and Washington Law & Politics magazines, and the Board of Managers of Novus Law (www.novuslaw.com), a global legal services outsourcing company in which LRC is a strategic and financial partner. In mid-1990, he co-developed TheLawOffice.com on the Microsoft Network and Internet. In early 1980, Mr. Seidl co-founded Templeton & Associates: Legal Assistant Services.

In 2003, Mr. Seidl co-produced the PricewaterhouseCoopers & Legal Research Center Knowledge Management Study: An In-Depth Look Into the Current Use and Future Trends of KM in the Legal Profession, in collaboration with PwC and the Legal Technology Institute at the University of Florida Levin College of Law. With Vance Opperman, former President and CEO of West Publishing; Edward Friedland, General Counsel of The Thomson Corporation; Richard Weise, former General Counsel of Motorola; and Stacey Supina, LRC Director of Research, Mr. Seidl co-authored the Legal Research Management chapter in the 2002-08 ACCA/West publication Successful Partnering Between Inside and Outside Counsel. He also co-authored the Legal Research chapter in the 2003 ATLA/West publication entitled Litigating Tort Cases, and was a contributing author to the Legal E-Business Guide (John Kelly, ed., Assoc. of Legal Administrators 2002). In 2000, Mr. Seidl was the co-editor of Strategic Partnering for Legal Services: New Rules, New Roles, Leaps of Faith and Spectacular Results for In-House and Outside Counsel at Heller Financial, authored by Mark Ohringer and Debra Snider. Mr. Seidl has been interviewed for articles in a variety of local and national publications, including the Wall Street Journal, Newsweek, National Law Journal, New York Times, Trial Magazine, ACCA Docket, Inside Counsel, Legal Information Alert, Minnesota Law & Politics, St. Paul Pioneer Press and Minneapolis Star Tribune. Mr. Seidl’s law-related lobbying activities include formal presentations to the Department of Justice, the National Press Club, and Op Ed articles in the New York Times.

Mr. Seidl frequently produces educational programs and speaks before major trade associations and conferences on issues in the legal industry. In 2008, Mr. Seidl produced a series of educational programs entitled Leading Legal Transformation: Your 2020 Vision of the Future for the InsideCounsel SuperConference in Chicago; The Texas General Counsel Forum’s Annual Meeting in Dallas; the Legal IT Forum in Turnberry Scotland; and the Association of Litigation Support Professionals Fall Conference in Chicago. In 2009, Mr. Seidl produced a Leading Legal Transformation program for the FDCC Annual Meeting in New York, and a program on Alternative Fee Arrangements for the Minnesota Council on Litigation Management in Minneapolis. Mr. Seidl also participated in the inaugural InsideCounsel & Law Department Consortium Managing Litigation as a Business Forum in Chicago in 2008. Other educational programs produced by Mr. Seidl include a workshop for the American Corporate Counsel Association entitled The Art of Appellate Brief Writing – The Corporate Practitioner’s Perspective, and a unique program entitled Best Practices In Corporate Research Management for ACCA’s Annual Meeting. In 1999 and 2000, in conjunction with DuPont, ACCA, CLA and West Group, Mr. Seidl co-produced a series of legal forums entitled Partnering & Convergence: Successful Strategies for Controlling Legal Costs. In 2000, Mr. Seidl co-produced Partnering 2000: Profiting From Client Collaboration with Heller Financial, Spherion, Merrill and West Group. Also in 2000, Mr. Seidl was a featured speaker at the Wisconsin ACCA National Chapter presentation Technology Innovations In Legal Knowledge Management and at the ACCA E-Lawyer 2000 presentation Internet Best Practices For The Small Law Department. Mr. Seidl was co-chair of the 2001 LawPartnering Forum: Powering-Up Partnering Relationships; the 2002 LawPartnering Forum: Team Empowerment Through Financial Rewards and Technology Solutions; and the 2003 LawPartnering Forum: Partnering Pay-Off—Measuring Returns on Partnering Initiatives. From 1987 through 1992, Mr. Seidl chaired the Practice Development Section of the Minnesota State Bar Association, and produced legal education seminars on a variety of ethical, client relations, practice development and legal service marketing subjects.

Mr. Seidl received his law degree from William Mitchell College of Law and his undergraduate degree from Bethel College. He can be reached at 1.800.776.9377, or by email at jseidl@lrci.com.

Christopher R. Ljungkull

Chief Executive Officer

Christopher R. Ljungkull is a 1976 graduate of Amherst College and a 1981 graduate of William Mitchell College of Law. Mr. Ljungkull co-founded Legal Research Center in 1978. He is currently LRC's Chief Executive Officer and is responsible for LRC's financial management. In 1999, Mr. Ljungkull was named Co-Chairman of LRC's Board of Directors. Mr. Ljungkull currently sits on the Board of Directors of Strategic Radar, one of LRC’s strategic/financial partners.

In addition to his LRC responsibilities, Mr. Ljungkull was employed by West Publishing from 1987 to 1994. At West, he managed the marketing of software products in the Electronic and Editorial Processes and Publications Division. Prior to assuming that position, he was responsible for WESTLAW advertising and for developing WESTLAW marketing plans. From 1982 to 1985, Mr. Ljungkull was a co-founder and director of the area's first and largest paralegal placement service, Templeton & Associates.

Stacey Supina

Director of Research

Stacey Supina directs content operations for Legal Research Center, Miller/Davis Company, and Click Industries. With a grounding of over ten years in LRC research work, Stacey manages LRC's research attorney staff and quality control group. Her professional background includes corporate compliance, employment matters, and business-to-business contracting. In addition to her work at LRC, Stacey teaches at the University of St. Thomas Graduate School of Business in Minneapolis and has lectured extensively in North America and Europe on a variety of legal technology and corporate governance topics. A licensed and published attorney, Stacey holds an LL.M. from University College London.

Mazen Haddad

Chief Information Officer

Mazen Haddad brings over twenty years of varied Information Technology experience to LRC’s customers. Mr. Haddad’s professional accomplishments include leading IT organizations, managing software development organizations, and architecting and designing software and hardware solutions, as well as hands-on software development.

Mr. Haddad spent the last seven years focusing on legal software and ways to improve the use of technology in the legal market space. Prior to joining LRC, he managed the software development organization for King & Spalding, one of largest law firms in the US, where he focused on building legal practice systems, Extranets, and knowledge management solutions for the firm and its clients.

Earlier, Mr. Haddad was on the frontier of Internet/Intranet development while working for MCI WorldCom, a Fortune-fifty company, where he was heavily involved in modernizing the company’s systems infrastructure.

Mr. Haddad holds a degree in Electrical Engineering from the University of Maryland.

Kelly D. Ray, Esq.

Vice President, Legal Strategy & General Counsel

Kelly D. Ray has dedicated over 20 years to improving shareholder and partner value by optimizing operational design, process improvement, legal services, and technology for corporate law departments, ethics and compliance programs, and law firms.

Ms. Ray practiced law for 11 years initially in a prestigious multi-national law firm with over 800 attorneys and then in-house for a Fortune 500 analog, DSP, RF, and DLP semiconductor solutions manufacturer with over 30,000 employees in more than 25 countries. As an attorney, she delivered proactive legal advice, drafted regulatory comments and contracts (including IT service agreements for divested businesses), conducted due diligence, defended litigation, and developed and deployed business and systems policies, procedures, processes, guidelines and manuals to drive awareness of legal requirements and maintain organizational compliance.

Ms. Ray has delivered both online and live compliance training and self-service ethics/legal resources. She has integrated or adapted existing systems and implemented new systems that streamline the delivery of legal research, work product and real-time compliance. Since serving as an integral team member in designing and developing PricewaterhouseCooper’s integrated governance, risk and compliance ("GRC") service offering, she has been an author of industry-led, consensus-based practices and other guidance on GRC with OCEG®. In short, Ms. Ray has been advising corporations on establishing effective legal and compliance programs since 1992.

Ms. Ray received her juris doctorate from University of California, Los Angeles School of Law. She received a bachelor of science in communication studies and completed all educational requirements for a second degree in computer studies from Northwestern University.

Ms. Ray's most recent publications include co-authoring the Legal Transformation Study: Your 2020 Vision of the Future (http://www.legaltransformation.com), and contributing authorship to the OCEG GRC Capability Model™. In addition to several articles, prior publications involving authorship or editorial roles include OCEG® Helpline/Hotline Handbook, OCEG® Measurement & Metrics Guide, OCEG® Internal Audit Guide, "Leading Corporate Integrity: The Role of the Chief Ethics and Compliance Officer," and the PricewaterhouseCoopers & Legal Research Center Knowledge Management Study: An In-Depth Look into the Current Use and Future Trends of KM in the Legal Profession. She has also been a conference speaker on a variety of topics including knowledge management, expert systems, informational needs for GRC, and technology strategy.