2026 MIE National Conference for Legal Aid Managers

Legal aid managers make decisions every day—some small and immediate, others shaping programs, staffing, and long-term strategy. In an environment of complex community need and limited resources, data can be a powerful tool to support those decisions. But to be effective, data must be used in ways that remain grounded in people: clients, advocates, and communities.
This session explores how managers can use data to inform both day-to-day decisions and larger organizational choices while maintaining a relational, community-centered approach. Drawing on Cleveland Legal Aid’s Wealth Building Program, participants will learn how intake trends, client feedback, and a community needs assessment revealed widespread loss of generational wealth—and how those insights helped create a new practice area, including decisions about outreach, staffing, and service delivery.

The session will also examine how case data, outcomes, and workload patterns can inform supervision, resource allocation, and performance management. Participants will learn to identify the most useful data points for different decisions, understand the limits of what data can show, and integrate quantitative and qualitative insights into their management approach. Consistent with a people-centered framework, the session will highlight strategies for sharing and interpreting data transparently, incorporating staff perspectives, and using data to strengthen trust, collaboration, and decision-making.