We live in complex times that – although comprised of some controllable and predictable elements – is largely uncontrollable, unpredictable and evolving (emergent).[1] Like many other professions, the legal profession is facing increasingly urgent and intensifying trends and challenges that it has not encountered before.
Professions have long been seen as a path for success: well-educated, highly credentialized, well-compensated, white-collar workers. However, the “hallmark characteristics of precarious work are seeping into professional work, despite professionals’ high level of education, credentials, and even experience”.[2] For lawyers, “the dream of practicing the same way previous generations did is” unrealistic.[3]
‘Fundamental shift’ is transforming the delivery of legal services.
– ABA Journal[4]
Education is no longer a ticket to a stable job for professionals, let alone wealth,[5] and being a member of a regulated profession – without more – is not a key determinant of sustainable job security or lucrative professional success.[6] Beyond the increased pace of change and client demands and expectations, law firms face formidable competition from alternative legal service providers (including the Big Four professional services firms, and their own corporate clients’ in-house legal departments).[7] Whether recognized as a disruption, eruption or interruption, there has been an “explosion of new service models in law that leverage some combination of ‘people, process and technology’ to change the delivery and value design for legal services”.[8]
As we enter 2020 there is a pervasive sense of anxiety cutting across all professional occupations, employment sectors, wage levels, ages, and career stages.[9] White-collar work today is becoming fundamentally insecure,[10] with even highly educated legal professionals experiencing some vulnerability, economic insecurity and/or precarious working conditions. And there is “no safe harbour” – and no simple answers – for the legal profession over the next decade.[11]
We found a widespread sense of economic insecurity among both securely and precariously employed professionals. There is a sense that stable jobs in their field are increasingly hard to find: 58 per cent of all respondents, precarious or not, say that jobs in their profession used to be more secure.
– No Safe Harbour[12]
Building a successful career is a challenge these days, to say the least. Even first-rate legal advice and services are a basic client expectation, and to be successful today’s lawyer needs to look for solutions in key aspects of their business – strategy, business and legal delivery model, client experience, organization design, operations, pricing, talent development and learning, purpose and meaning, etc. – through the lens of a future-ready mindset. The chances are that for many lawyers their status gave their life a certain narrative, with their role and experience and reputation key parts of that story. Now lawyers have the opportunity (or the necessity) to adapt to a new legal economy, developing and crafting a new narrative, and it is important that we spend some time thinking about what that is and what a ‘future-ready mindset’ means.[13]
Why? Because in an arms race of innovation and smarter technologies, future-ready mindsets are critical to take advantage of disruptive new business and client-centric legal service delivery models.
So, what are mindsets? They are the deeply held beliefs, attitudes and assumptions we create about who we are and how the world works. Our mindsets are the “mental maps that reflect and guide how” we “behave”, they shape the lives we lead, the actions we take and the future possibilities of the profession we operate within. The good news is that future-ready mindsets can be learned and developed, building a competitive advantage for lawyers and legal organizations by transcending our blind spots, improving our ability to embrace ambiguity and accelerated change, and help us to address the complex challenges of today’s fast-paced world and new legal economy.[14]
[O]rganizations know they need to change, but often the results has been a form of organizational whack-a-mole – a futile attempt at trying to swat at problems as they pop-up without understanding the root cause. … We can build a mindset, culture … to fix this.
– Why Companies Do ‘Innovation Theater’ Instead of Actual Innovation, Harvard Business Review[15]
Introduction
There appears to be nothing like political and economic upheaval to make the era of the 1980s and 1990s – a time reflective of a high stressed ‘button-downed’ legal profession, but exemplified by its career stability – to look good. This third decade of the 21st century is an era of dramatic change: legal technology and automation, artificial intelligence, alternative legal service providers, nearshoring and offshoring, the challenges of scale and reach, globalization, re-regulation and regulatory innovations and alternative business structures,[16] the gig economy, the accelerating pace of change, and other factors that have modernized the delivery of legal services. And across the world spurred competition, value-based pricing for legal consumers, and innovation.
This has begun the process of reducing the legal profession’s historical control of legal service delivery (and the legal industry), and as a side effect, stripping away any sense of career permanence for those members of the profession that continue to do business in the same old way, unable to see past rigid mental models[17] – whether that be a fixed mindset, tradition, and/or reliance upon self-regulation and an historically monopolistic status quo,[18] etc. – to address the evolving legal marketplace, often referred to as the new legal economy:[19]
“The legal market is approaching a tipping point. … The opportunities and risks that these forces present for legal market participants – whether they are in an in-house legal function, a law firm, an alternative service provider or elsewhere – should not be underestimated. …
Gradual evolution, which is the legal [profession’s and legal] market’s default response to any form of significant change, is failing to keep up with the rapidly accelerating pace of these developments. Greater agility and more radical thinking is needed. More importantly, participants in the legal market will have to confront the central challenge: where does my organisation fit into this emerging new world and how must it change in order to occupy that role?”
If you look at the entire alternative legal services or ‘new law’ sector, the last 10 years were focused on taking the bottom quartile of work away from law firms, or that staffing model, and moving it into centers of excellence. Now, that low complexity work has a great deal of competition in a good way … general counsel look for the next iteration of change and a new generation of differentiation … for performing complex legal work.
– ABA Journal: CEO discusses the disrupting, displacing and deconstructing of legal services[20]
The onset of the 2020s is bringing many professionals to new heights – or depths – of anxiety about the future. But here is why you should not fear the future – the challenge (which every generation has) is to take advantage of opportunities for growth that the coming changes will offer, while minimizing the problems that come along with it.[21] Do not reject change, but rather learn to embrace, manage and take advantage of its effects. Lawyers and legal organizations “that are doing that now are doing very well”.[22]
The problem is that most traditional legal organizations and lawyers do not have the mindset, strategic focus, adaptability or agility needed to undertake and embrace transformational innovation. And the legal profession must come to grips with ‘deficient skillsets and outdated mindsets’.
The new legal economy with its new challenges and risks demand new mindsets, strategies, and skillsets. To innovate, you have to be able to change your frame of mind.[23] Doing business in the same old way is now a recipe for failure. Just “like any career today, the law profession must adapt to” this “ever-changing world. Because of this, experienced lawyers as well as those just completing law school must be open to new ways of thinking and learning new skills”,[24] in short, to reframe and adopt future-ready mindsets – from a strategic mindset, to a growth mindset (that encompasses lifelong learning), to a client-centric mindset, an innovative and process-conscious mindset, and a technology and digital-friendly mindset – in order to be positioned to create a strong sustainable legal organization and business, whether that be a law firm, legal department, or alternative legal services delivery model.
It is a new year, a new decade and new chance to grow as a lawyer, as a legal organization, and as a profession, with new ideas and innovations. With the ‘Fresh Start Effect’ (i.e. people are more likely to take action towards a goal after temporal landmarks that represent new beginnings), this may be the perfect opportunity for lawyers and legal organizations to re-frame their mindsets (and culture) and proceed forward confidently with a clean slate.
Machine learning, or artificial intelligence, will have a profound effect, reducing the demand for routine work in accounting, finance, medicine, law and industrial processes. This is not new. … Our challenge is to take advantage of the wonderful opportunities for growth it will offer while making sure we minimize the problems that come along with it. Avoiding change is not the answer.
– Jack Mintz, Don’t reject change – manage its effects[25]
‘Revolutionary Changes afoot’ in the New Legal Economy
Most lawyers and legal leaders recognize that they must run their legal organizations more like a business to remain viable and competitive in today’s rapidly changing marketplace.[26] Under pressure from clients to become more innovative and efficient In this era of digital transformation, many legal organizations acknowledge that their operating model may have to change to incorporate the appropriate use of technology, process, technical and multi-disciplinary talent, alternative staffing models and eco-systems of legal and non-legal partners, and outsourced high-value functions (i.e. back-office administration, operations and technology functions, etc.)[27]:[28]
“As we enter a new decade … [t]he disaggregation of legal services will continue, fuelled by technological advances, new providers, and commercially savvy legal buyers becoming ever more sophisticated and adept at determining what constitutes legal ‘advice’ versus legal information or other services. The role a ‘black letter lawyer’ plays will undoubtedly [be limited to high-value legal work] as clients drive the changes the profession is failing to make on its own.”
The practice of law is shrinking, and the business of law is expanding. … What it means to be a lawyer as well as how legal services are best delivered – and by whom – are questions that legal buyers are now asking.
– Mark Cohen[29]
The biggest challenge is that most people – particularly experienced lawyers who may be lulled into a false sense of security by the skills and experience and success they have built up over their career – do not like change and tend to resist it as a result: “The legal industry has been known to be amongst those that resist change the most and are slow to adapt. Those working within the industry are either burying their heads in the sand and are in denial, or worse, they are not aware of the changes at all. Many are fearful”[30] as the new legal economy has become a buyers market[31]:[32]
“The traditional law firm economic model was premised on the assumptions that (i) legal work was labor intensive, (ii) that only lawyers could provide the services required, and (iii) that law firms would control the design and delivery of legal services. It reflected a seller’s market in which all key decisions about how legal matters were staffed, scheduled, conducted, and priced were essentially made by law firms. The model resulted in a highly leveraged, pyramid structure … and … [t]he traditional structure worked very well for law firms. In the years prior to 2008 …
Though remarkably resilient for a long time, the traditional model, over the past decade, has largely broken apart, driven by a number of factors. First, the availability of market information about firms and their practices has grown exponentially, fueled by a wide variety of trade publications, rating agencies, and social media sources. This growing body of competitive information has contributed to the relentless growth in competition across the market. Second, the rapid growth of new technologies has made legal work far less labor intensive than it was ten years ago, and that trend will undoubtedly continue. And third, the Great Recession that began in late 2007 triggered a number of significant market shifts that have had seismic repercussions in recent years. Those repercussions are reflected in three new market realities that …
[1] Clients Are In Control. … In stark contrast to the traditional law firm model, clients are now in control of all key decisions impacting legal representation – from staffing and scheduling decisions to outsourcing requirements, from project management to pricing structures. … . With their newfound power, clients are insisting on more value for their legal spend. And by “value,” clients now mean higher levels of predictability, efficiency, and cost effectiveness in the delivery of legal services, quality being assumed. Of course, these new expectations do not apply in all circumstances. There will always be “bet the company” or other unique cases in which clients will insist on the best lawyers they can find, with no real consideration of cost. But those instances are few and far between. In the vast majority of cases, clients will award work based of their assessment of which firm can perform the work most predictably, efficiently, and cost effectively – again, with quality being assumed. …
[2] Competition Is More Fierce than Ever. In a market characterized by sluggish demand growth, the only way for one firm to improve its market position viz-a-viz another is by taking existing market share. That in turn drives increased competition. …
[3] Law Firms Are Losing Market Share. … This loss reflects in part the growth of corporate law departments themselves as many departments have increased their in-house staffs to handle a growing variety of matters. But it also reflects the transfer of work to alternative legal service providers, non-law firms that are increasingly competing for a range of services historically provided primarily by law firms. … [T]he ALSP market had grown significantly to about $10.7 billion in annual revenues, or a compound annual growth rate of 12.9 percent. … the average growth rate for an ALSP not affiliated with a law firm was about 24 percent per year. Equally significant, the … services provided by ALSPs were rapidly moving ‘up market’ to include (among others) such sophisticated work as regulatory risk and compliance, project management, legal research, and corporate due diligence. It seems inevitable that, given current market pressures, growth of ALSPs will continue for the foreseeable future.”
Yes, “demand for law firm services registered its second straight year of growth in 2019 – a feat accomplished only twice since the Great Recession. Still, law firm leaders should not overlook ‘fundamental shifts’ occurring in the law firm market” and the stratification between routine legal work and bespoke complex legal work.[33] Demanding improved efficiency, predictability and cost-effectiveness, clients have taken ‘decisive control’ of “who performs legal services and how they are performed, bucking the decades-old ‘law firm-centric’ model according to the 2020 Report on the State of the Legal Market”.[34] ‘Revolutionary changes are afoot’ in the market for legal services according to the report – clients are actively managing their relationships with external counsel; alternative legal service competitors are gaining ground (including the Big Four accounting firms, and in-house legal departments[35]); and some innovative law firms are responding to market changes by addressing new legal service delivery models and leveraging everything from leadership (i.e. non-lawyer CEOs and allied C-suite professionals, business driven, employee and client-centric) to technology (including internal systems and on-line services to assist clients, investing in legal tech start-ups, establishing technology incubators, and launching their own software development businesses) to multidisciplinary professionals to flexible staffing models (i.e. building captive ALSP via practice groups; ALSPs as third party vendors; ecosystem partnering and outsourcing):[36]
“For the last three or four decades, the legal industry has operated on a model that has been essentially law-firm centric, a model that allowed senior partners in major law firms to control virtually every aspect of how legal services were defined, priced, and delivered. Although there have been undercurrents of change evident for some time … and although the 2008 recession undoubtedly accelerated and probably exacerbated those dramatic forces of change, the current model has remained remarkably resilient. One way to look at the market over the past 10 years is to see it as a period of continuing, incremental improvement in which law firms have adjusted and readjusted the existing model sufficiently to sustain respectable — though certainly not extraordinary — performance. However, taking that view is seeing only one side of the story. Over this same period, there has been mounting evidence that the underlying model itself is changing, that clients, non-law firm competitors, and even many law firms are now operating with very different assumptions about the role law firm services should play in the legal ecosystem and how such services should be delivered. In the past year or so, this evidence has grown to the point that it seems apparent that a fundamental shift is now well underway. …
All of the above-described developments — the dramatic change in the role of clients, the significant growth in non-law firm competitors, and the innovative responses by law firms themselves — are now beginning to coalesce in what can realistically be called a new emerging model for legal services. While it would be premature to say that this new model has become the “norm” for law firms across the market, it is increasingly clear that the market is moving decisively in its direction. …
[W]e can fully expect that clients will continue to drive all service providers, including law firms, toward multidisciplinary practice-type services designed to provide integrated solutions to business problems. That, in turn, suggests a new model in which law firms are more collaborative (with clients as well as with other service providers, including non-law firms); more open to developing multidisciplinary approaches and solutions; more aggressive in pursuing technology-based solutions; more committed to value-based pricing; more focused on outcomes; and more committed to continuous work process improvements. …
In the long run, the fundamental choice that most law firms face is to adjust to the new realities of the marketplace or face an increasing erosion of their abilities to compete effectively. The outcome may not be immediate; some law firms may opt to make incremental improvements to the ‘traditional way of doing things’ in the hopes of staving off the inevitable. But sooner or later, the market will prevail. … The risk for most law firms isn’t complete obsolescence. There will always be a need for legal work. The risk is marginalization, being pushed to the side to fight with each other for crumbs as others deliver exactly what the market demands. And the market is speaking loudly to those who will listen.”
As well, a majority of retail consumers and small business owners simply cannot afford to hire a lawyer for legal issues they may have, which means there is a huge corporate and retail legal market that is underserved – or simply not served at all – by the legal profession and the traditional legal services delivery model.[37] There is a market here for the enterprising lawyers and legal organizations that can figure out an appropriate business and legal service delivery model to cost-effectively meet the unmet demand.
‘Revolutionary changes afoot’ in market for legal services.
– Jurist[38]
Sadly, the new legal economy is an illustration of the principle that while the profession might share the same facts, its lawyers can still refuse to share a reality. A lawyer’s traditional skillsets (i.e. identification of law, distillation of facts, prediction of resolution of problem based on precedent) and narrow mindset (i.e. fixed, precedent focused, linear thinking, risk averse) does not encourage strategic theory and thinking, innovation, creativity, adaptability and agility, cross-functional collaboration, or risk-taking.[39]
And, a large part of the problem is that we all fall prey to our mindsets and the availability heuristic: we base our judgments on what comes to mind most easily. It is the combination of our mindset, survivorships bias (i.e. what got you here), and the availability heuristic that shapes the worldview of lawyers, “creating an effective reality distortion field and presenting seemingly insurmountable communication challenges for most” leaders of legal organizations[40] trying to deal with the changing reality of the new legal market:[41]
“Ultimately, a profession that refuses to thoughtfully evolve a model that is stubbornly predicated on individual (rather than team) incentives driven almost entirely by hourly based (internally focussed), rather than value based (client focussed), measures of performance and success, will not only experience the growing dissatisfaction of its clients, but more concerningly, suffer accelerating disruption.”
As psychologists have now amply demonstrated, we humans have a tendency to search for, interpret, favor, and recall information in a way that confirms our pre-existing beliefs or hypotheses – a cognitive tendency that is referred to as confirmation bias … And there is some evidence that this cognitive bias can be especially strong among professionals.
– 2019 Report on the State of the Legal Market, Georgetown University Law School and Thomson Reuters[42]
Lawyers need to develop “future-ready mindsets and skills” that challenge rather than seek to justify the status quo. The lawyers and legal organizations that will be successful will reframe their mindset(s), embrace the changes and create opportunities for themselves. And it is important to always keep sight of the objective behind them: to drive efficiencies within their legal organizations – from law firms to legal departments to alternative legal services providers – in order to provide client-centric cost effective legal services and solutions to clients who ‘want more for less’. Those lawyers and legal organizations that have progressed to this point “are doing very well”.[43]
Future readiness brings together “the right mindset and skillset to constantly get ahead, supported by having context-relevant business and operating models” (that are reviewed constantly and revised as required).[44] The biggest challenges will be driven “less by technology and more by the business issues that need to be addressed”[45] – ultimately the lawyers and legal organizations that will see the greatest success in the future are those that adopt the appropriate mindsets in respect to strategy, business models, operations, technology, learning and best practices, solutions, collaboration and multi-disciplinary services, and client-centric cost-effective legal service delivery.
And, while transformations within business and legal organizations “are almost universally assumed to be top-down processes, in reality” with the right mindset legal professionals at all levels can make significant contributions toward change.
The marketplace ‘gold’ is … designing business models that deliver impactful customer solutions consistently, scalably, efficiently, cost-effectively, collaboratively, transparently, and measurably.
– Forbes[46]
Legal organizations looking for relevance in the new legal economy (in which there is no longer a single – or law firm only – legal market) must look to understand how business and legal service delivery models can succeed in these challenging times.[47] The macroeconomic statistics are sobering, and traditional law firms and their lawyers continue to have “trouble distinguishing year-to-year movement in metrics with underlying change in industry economics”[48]:[49]
“A law firm providing excellent legal advice and services is a basic client expectation. This is table stakes. The traditional law firm’s reliance on practice excellence, pedigree, and reputation—without more—is no longer sufficient to be competitive or sustainable. Law is not exclusively about law firms anymore, and that is putting enormous pressure on the traditional law firm structure and economic model. Clients are looking for and expecting from their law firms [legal departments, alternative legal service providers, etc.] greater efficiency, price predictability, and cost-effectiveness in the legal services they contract for and receive. A sustainable “value proposition” in the new normal requires a new business model that incorporates and delivers effective legal service delivery (utilizing technology, process, and alternative staffing models: the right person – lawyer or otherwise – for the right task), practice excellence, and customer service. In short: the right resources, doing the right work, in the most cost effective and efficient manner[50] – not your typical law firm [or legal department].”
A new business model is not going to replace lawyers per se, but lawyers and legal organizations that adopt the appropriate business (and legal service delivery) models will eventually outperform – if not replace – the lawyers and legal organizations that do not. As the legal profession continues to evolve, it is about ensuring that lawyers and legal organizations have the necessary mindsets and skillsets required to recognize and address the issues and meet client expectations in respect to legal service delivery.
With change comes opportunity – an opportunity to ‘redesign’ the delivery of client-centric legal services using technology (particularly AI), processes, organizational design, project management, outsourcing and flexible staffing models, value-based pricing structures,[51] and by increasing the collaboration of multi-disciplinary teams across law firms, legal departments,[52] and eco-systems.
Positioning yourself to ride the wave of economic and cultural volatility that lies ahead will require a prolonged and sustained effort. That might be daunting to hear, but as you will spend the next decade working anyways, why not work smarter?
– Kourtney Whitehead[53]
Reframing Your Mindset and Career: how to navigate the Next Decade of Rapid Change and Innovation
The “threat of an economic winter is ever present. For law firms, the memory of the Great Recession marked the end of the golden age of legal services”[54] – and, as we enter 2020 “the legal industry will continue to face major challenges over the next ten years”.[55] For the legal profession to continue to be successful, there needs to be significant innovation in respect to the traditional legal organization’s business and legal service delivery model (both law firms and legal departments), operations, and brand.
However, the legal profession needs to also look at the legal market more fundamentally and ask ourselves: what’s the value we bring as lawyers in the legal marketplace, and can we deliver that value to corporate and retail clients in new ways that is faster, better, client-centric and cost-effective.[56]
Whatever it is, you can become better at it. But … you will not get better if 1) you don’t want to and 2) you aren’t willing to feel the discomfort of doing things differently.
– Harvard Business Review: ‘If You Want to Get Better at Something, Ask Yourself These Two Questions’[57]
Unfortunately, a traditionally risk-averse precedent focused profession (that may attract linear thinking and fixed mindsets),[58] combined with “extensive past experience and success can lead to overconfidence and being blinkered when faced with new challenges arising from new competitors, technologies, and business models”[59] – exemplified most succinctly by legal technology[60] and alternative legal service providers which have become “a major factor in how the world conducts legal business” today (i.e. corporate-structured law firms, professional service firms, in-house legal departments, legal outsourcing operations, lawtech or legaltech, regtech, NewLaw, etc.)[61]:[62]
“In the common-law system, every successful lawyer is at heart a traditionalist because of the centrality of precedent to legal reasoning. Change happens incrementally, and the answer to many questions is, ‘Let’s see what we’ve done in the past.’ This mode of thought has powerful [but negative] effects on both lawyers and law schools. Especially in a time of crisis, the instinct is to ride out the storm, even if a few captains go down with their ships.”
Many misconstrue that innovation in law firms is all about technology. It isn’t. Some of the most fundamental innovation that is occurring has to do with how work is done, why, by whom and for whom. Innovation focuses on people, process and platform.
– Susan Duncan[63]
Five and ten year strategic and career plans are difficult as the pace of change has increased in respect to the business of law. It is difficult to predict what the economic – let alone the technological – environment will be in 2021 and 2022, much less the coming decade. So what then can be done to improve or protect sustainability, marketability and earning potential? A key element of the answer involves the thoughtful and deliberate identification and pursuit of an ambitious but achievable goal – to develop and embrace “future-ready mindsets and skills”.
But what exactly do we mean by future-ready mindsets and skills when we talk about lawyers and legal organizations? There are many different kinds of mindsets that we can apply,[64] but our focus for the purpose of this article is on the following five mindsets (which also includes or encompasses values, principles and practices):[65]
- A strategic mindset (that recognizes the value of entrepreneurial thinking[66] to make sense of a rapidly changing environment): Promoting a strategic entrepreneurial mindset encourages lawyers and legal organizations to identify and pursue innovative opportunities to produce new value and economic success “in a complex and dynamic world”.[67] This mindset (and associated entrepreneurial behaviours, motivation and capacity) can be learned,[68] encouraging lawyers and legal leaders – independently or within an organization – to embrace strategic management[69] and “take calculated risks and accept the realities of change and uncertainty”.[70] Strategic mindset and management (i.e. strategy formulation, implementation, and evaluation) allows a lawyer and an organization to set a direction in the face of uncertainty utilizing long-term approaches and short-term tools and methods. A strategic mindset allows one to reframe what “winning” means in line with a clear understanding of what enables the legal organization or individual lawyer to generate value. We operate in a “competency-based world that is fluid and requires intellectual agility” and life-long learning: invest in your strategic management approach,[71] business and legal delivery model, organizational culture, process, employees, and technology.
- A growth mindset and lifelong learning: This is arguably the most important mindset and critical skill of the 21st century. Research from psychology suggests there may be a reason behind lawyers’ resistance to change – many have a fixed mindset, instead of a growth mindset. The marriage of a growth mindset with a dedication to lifelong learning is arguably the most powerful combination for consistent and explosive career and organizational growth. With a growth mindset, one can learn and adapt throughout life, so taking risks and even failing are simply part of the journey. Lawyers and legal organizations that can adapt and are proactive – using a growth and learning mindset to take measured risks to discover new solutions – can turn changing market drivers into opportunities. Lawyers who are reactive, and maintain a fixed mindset, will be left behind. In “a traditionally risk-averse profession, lawyers who don’t adapt to change are making the riskiest move of all”,[72] as “the illiterate of the 21st Century will not be those who cannot read and write, but those who cannot learn, unlearn, and relearn”.[73]
- A client-centric mindset (to improve the value proposition): The successful lawyers and legal organizations will be creative problem-solvers that combine insights about what clients need with new business models, technologies, and operational design (arguably the magic formula for success).[74] Adopting a client-centric mindset can allow lawyers (private practice, corporate in-house and government) to “add value” and “trust” to the client relationship (in fact and in perception) rather than being a “necessary evil”. As noted by one legal commentator, “this is the age of the customer – act accordingly”;[75] unnecessary conflicts are out,[76] professionalism and client-centric cost-effective legal service delivery are more important than ever. Differentiation is an imperative, and trust is the most valuable currency needed to sell sophisticated professional services.[77] All lawyers and legal providers should ask: “What are we now? What should we be? And how do we bridge the gap” and build trust? [78] Should we “change our business model? Our delivery methods or channels? Our talent mix”?[79] And, clients and legal personnel want to be associated with legal organizations that serve a higher purpose than simply maximizing profit – what you do matters, who you are matters. “Do not lose sight of the primacy and power of true service, meaning and purpose”[80] – try to exist in a client-centric universe that is five centimeters to the left of every other legal provider.
- An innovative and process-conscious mindset (to improve operational efficiency, legal service delivery, and organizational design): Excellence in legal practice or legal advice does not necessarily equate to excellence in delivering legal services.[81] To foster an innovation mindset – one that is creative and agile in carving out pathways for continuous improvement and building foundational capabilities that support the entire legal organization – you need to question everything, including the acceptance of the status quo.[82] Adopting an innovative and process conscious collaborative mindset allows lawyers in law firms and legal departments to design and co-create more efficient ways to do and deliver legal work. Much of the process and workflow of legal service – whether a corporate lawyer or litigator – can be identified to improve efficiency for technological streamlining and automation. And, history has shown that organizational innovation is needed first to unlock the full potential of new technologies. Legal organizations must continue to learn and collaborate, and this “new learning organization” must be designed with streamlined flexible systems and evolvable business models so that it can continuously adapt to the environment. Organizational change along these lines will be challenging, and will require leadership and design thinking moving beyond one-size-fits-all programs focused only on standardized processes and premeditated timelines.[83] Traditional legal organizations and industry boundaries are blurring; and competition and collaboration also occur within and between ecosystems – opening up clusters of legal organizations that can form temporary, mutually evolving partnerships.[84] An innovative mindset increases a legal organization’s “agility by determining which features of their organizational design will be stable and unchanging” (i.e. a primary axis of organization, a few signature processes, shared values) “and by creating dynamic elements that adapt quickly to new challenges and opportunities” (i.e. temporary performance cells, flow-to-work staffing models, minimum-viable-product iterations).[85] This corresponds with the rise worldwide of legal administrators and operations managers focussed on creating innovative, efficient, and effective business operations.[86]
- A technology and digital-friendly mindset (to improve domain expertise): In legal technology, to this point in time has brought changes that have transformed aspects of the practice of law and the delivery of legal services.[87] Going forward, fluency with digital[88] and technology and digital transformation is a must – in respect to how legal professionals work, make decisions, and deliver legal services and interact with clients. To be successful, over the next decade every legal organization will need to be a “technology or digital legal organization” (in the sense that digital technology and AI will be part of the core business, delivery of legal services, and client experience – entrenched in all aspects of the legal organization as opposed to operating in a silo), and every lawyer must champion digital transformation across their organization.[89] Moving forward, lawyers have to start looking at using legal technology as a way to not only provide efficiency, but to amplify their own abilities by focusing on cognitive non-repetitive tasks, cross-functional collaboration, and building environments that encourage the generation of ideas. A digital friendly mindset means being cognizant of data, networks, platforms, ‘intelligent augmentation’, and their implications (i.e. technology to do the routinized work required to prepare the way for lawyer thinking, insights and decisions). A technology mindset allows a lawyer to augment and increase their capability in approaching a complex problem situation, to gain comprehension, and derive solutions for their client (i.e. legal research, analysis, insights, decisions and recommendations). A technology mindset allows effective lawyers to better understand and analyze decentralized approaches of many new business models. The burgeoning legal reach of privacy and cybersecurity additionally reinforce the importance of these two areas. However, “technology is not a panacea, it is an enabler”.[90]
A key message for the legal profession is that technology – while extremely important as “part of the solution” – cannot be seen as “the solution”, or as a shortcut to recapture years of competitive gaps as against the best in class. Legal technology should be seen and recognized as a tool (albeit an important tool) to boost the implementation of an appropriate, competitive, and well-designed business and operating model for any legal organization’s ‘new normal’.[91] For those lawyers and legal organizations “who can find ways to use AI to augment, not replace, judgement and empathy”, the “future is very bright indeed”.[92]
It’s tempting to look for simple definitions, but to be meaningful and sustainable, we believe that digital should be seen less as a thing and more a way of doing things. To help make this definition more concrete, we’ve broken it down into three attributes: creating value at the new frontiers of the business world, creating value in the processes that execute a vision of customer experiences, and building foundational capabilities that support the entire structure. … A digital mindset.
– McKinsey & Company[93]
Try not to lose sight of these “mindset” goals as we move into and through the 2020s. Use them as touchstones to be better placed and more receptive to the new ways of doing business and delivering legal services, and to help lawyers and legal organizations grow more resilient and in demand no matter what the next decade holds.
Effective leaders and lawyers must be aware of the benefits and limitations of their mindset(s).[94] As the scope of the organization expands to encompass broader ecosystems, leaders need to adopt a new approach that embraces “entrepreneurial thinking” – adapting to the environment and client expectations as required – as opposed to thinking that the current knowledge is sufficient. Can we reframe our mindsets and strategic management to orchestrate a complex dynamic system of people, processes and technology, and guide it through “the right resources, doing the right work, in the most cost effective and efficient manner” to productive outcomes.[95]
New business and legal service delivery models deployed in the legal marketplace must be supported by new capabilities, processes, technology, and organizational structures.[96] A legal organization’s business model, to be successful, will require working with an ecosystem of legal and non-legal partners to create client-centric best-in-class offerings, and take advantage of organizational design, processes, and technology developments that make it more efficient and less expensive to reach legal consumers and provide services – which in turn will increase demand for those legal services:[97]
“The practice of law will see more change over the next decade than it has seen in the past century. Most traditional law firms are not prepared for the technological and economic reality of today’s changing legal market, failing to proactively innovate, adopt and initiate efficient processes, technology, and – most importantly – a competitive business model to meet the changing demands of business.”
No matter how old you are today, you’ll be ten years older at the turn of the next decade. Start planning now to position this older version of yourself to remain marketable. … Don’t let this next decade come and go with you still listing the same skills on your résumé or stuck in old management practices. Make sure your skill set and career story are evolving.
– Forbes[98]
Conclusion
The legal profession is in a period of major change, and globally the legal industry is poised for far more significant transformation. Once insulated, law has become one of the most competitive markets in the new normal.[99] As the legal services delivery model and legal market evolves nationally and across the globe there are significant implications for how lawyers and legal organizations will need to adapt.
The type of disruption most agencies are facing right now is a once-in-every-few-centuries event. Disruption today is more than just changes in technology, or channel, or competitors – it’s all of them, all at once.
– Harvard Business Review[100]
Law is no longer solely about lawyers or law firms, and lawyers and the traditional law firm are no longer seen as “the straw that stirs the drink”,[101] but rather one feature in a broader legal industry supply chain. Corporate clients are demanding much more value from their legal service providers for their legal spend, more cost effective legal services, and problem solving that straddles disciplinary lines – such as law and business, technology (and the Fourth Industrial Revolution),[102] and strategy. Corporate clients are engaged in a “paradigm shift”:[103]
“(1) an increasing willingness to procure services from providers with delivery models different than the traditional law firm partnership model; (2) taking more work in-house; (3) sourcing work – either internally or externally – to providers that are better aligned than law firms with the company’s risk tolerance and enterprise objectives; (4) utilizing technology, process, and ‘the right person for the right task’ to promote efficiency, mitigate risk, and reduce cost; and (5) rejecting the longstanding myth that only law firms – and lawyers – must perform all ‘legal’ tasks. Legal problems are increasingly viewed as business challenges raising legal issues.”
And the legal profession appears to be mired in the mindset and training of the 20th century’s third industrial revolution.[104] As we enter the 2020s, some lawyers and legal organizations have a head start on future-ready mindsets and the emerging legal ecosystem while others will need to catch up quickly to ensure continued relevance and resilience. Future-ready mindsets and skillsets can be learned and cultivated, and they are a competitive advantage and key enabler for all legal organizations and lawyers prepared to embrace them. They are crucial for lawyers to stand out and get ahead in their legal career: “creativity, agility and clear thinking will be the characteristics of successful lawyers. There will be no place for ‘tick the box’ mindsets” in the legal organizations “of the future”.[105]
Developing a long-term business strategy now is the key to getting ahead in your legal career tomorrow. People have a lot of choices when it comes to legal counsel and so your motive and your mindset help you stand out.
– Meranda Vieyra, National Law Review[106]
The status quo is unsustainable. The success of the legal profession will depend on an openness to change and capacity to adapt.[107] Leveraging the tools and resources available is characteristic of high-performing businesses and professionals around the world. The same is true for the legal sector.[108] The legal services model going forward “will require a dramatic re-thinking” to ensure it is supported by appropriate capabilities, processes and organizational structures, and is “client-centric, collaborative, data driven, tech-enabled, multidisciplinary, diverse, agile, constantly improving, scaled, capitalized, and digitally transformed”.[109]
The success of the legal profession will be dependent upon its ability and willingness to see and embrace the challenges and opportunities afforded by new and emerging tools, resources, and methods of working. Above all, it will depend on the profession’s mindset(s) and capacity to evolve and adapt. A stable job for life is arguably a thing of the past, such that the ability to identify, pivot and adapt to the changes in the new legal economy are valuable skills to learn.[110]
Yes, learning “anything new is, by its nature, uncomfortable. You will need to act in ways that are unfamiliar. Take risks that are new”.[111] But lawyers that develop these future-ready mindsets will have a strong sense of challenge, enjoy variety and begin to see change and disruptions and challenges in life not as nefarious but as interesting opportunities to learn and grow. Even though the future is uncertain and sometimes frightening, there will be a belief that one’s own actions make a real difference in influencing and affecting the outcome.[112] And ultimately, the ability for lawyers and legal organizations to constantly evolve and adjust to the demands of the new legal economy will attract and maintain clients and maintain market value.
Change and opportunity are flip sides of a coin. The best way to adapt to change is to be positioned for the opportunities it produces. This means understanding the marketplace and acquiring new skills it prizes. … The role lawyers play will be determined by what they can contribute to the process of delivering legal services more efficiently and cost effectively to a wider customer base.
– The New Legal Career, Forbes[113]
The key to establishing a viable, competitive, and relevant legal career is future-ready mindsets and innovation – not just the development and adoption of technology-driven platforms and service delivery models, although they are critical, but through new ways of thinking and new ideas about how legal organizations and their business models are structured and legal services are delivered. If done successfully, the outcome will be a stronger profession, with stronger lawyers and legal organizations that – in today’s legal market – are destined to become influential, if not industry leaders.
Whatever the future may bring, neither lawyers nor the legal profession can afford to be blinkered or complacent.
Eric Sigurdson
Endnotes:
[1] Ash Buchanan, Complexity inside and out, Benefit Mindset (medium.com), August 22, 2017; Ash Buchanan, The nature of mindsets, Benefit Mindset (medium.com), March 16, 2017.
[2] Trish Hennessy and Ricardo Tranjan, No Safe Harbour: Precarious Work and Economic Insecurity Among Skilled Professionals in Canada, Canadian Center for Policy Alternatives, August 2018. Also see, Louis Hyman, Temp: How American Work, American Business, and the American Dream Became Temporary, Viking Press, 2018; Sandra Shutt, Despair ahead: Millennial lawyers and the legal job market, Canadian Lawyer, July 10, 2017; Christopher Banks, The American Legal Profession: The Myths and Realities of Practicing Law, CQ Press, 2018.
[3] Anders Spile, How to build new pillars of the law firm, ABA Journal, January 30, 2020.
[4] Cassens Weiss, ‘Fundamental shift’ is transforming the delivery of legal services, new report concludes, ABA Journal, January 6, 2020.
[5] Annie Lowrey, The College Wealth Premium Has Collapsed, The Atlantic, January 8, 2020.
[6] Trish Hennessy and Ricardo Tranjan, No Safe Harbour: Precarious Work and Economic Insecurity Among Skilled Professionals in Canada, Canadian Center for Policy Alternatives, August 2018; Bernard Burk, The New Normal Ten Years In: The Job Market for New Lawyers Today and What it Means for the Legal Academy Tomorrow, 13 (3) FIU Law Review 341, 2019; Christopher Banks, The American Legal Profession: The Myths and Realities of Practicing Law, CQ Press, 2018; Holly Lake, Canada’s growing student debt crisis, National (CBA), October 21, 2019; Noam Scheiber, An Expensive Law Degree, and No Place to Use It, New York Times, June 17, 2016; Kathleen Elkins, Goldman Sachs CEO: ‘The most you get out of law school is debt’, CNBC, August 18, 2016; Sandra Shutt, Despair ahead: Millennial lawyers and the legal job market, Canadian Lawyer, July 10, 2017; Daniel Fish, Are There Too Many Lawyers?, Precedent JD (precedentjd.com), September 6, 2017; Anita Balakrishnan, What will Ontario do with more lawyers?, Canadian Lawyer, August 13, 2018; Omar Ha-Redeye, Law Graduates Still Struggling in Job Market, Slaw, April 26, 2015; Sally Kane, The 10 Challenges About a Career As a Lawyer, The Balance Careers, November 20, 2019; Luis Millan, Young Quebec lawyers face bleak prospects, Law in Quebec, July 12, 2016; Michael Grothaus, Bet You Didn’t See This Coming: 10 Jobs That Will Be Replaced by Robots, Fast Company, January 19, 2017; Jeremy Hill, Deloitte Insight: Over 100,000 legal roles to be automated, Legal IT Insider, March 16, 2016; Daniel Fish, The lucrative days of document review are over, Precedent (lawandstyle.ca), March 7, 2017; The Reluctant Rise of Project Management in Law, Legal Mosaic, March 24, 2019; Neil McMahon, Law of the jungle: Lawyers now an endangered species, The Sydney Morning Herald, October 11, 2014; Georgina Ramin, Why A Law Degree Doesn’t Make a Lawyer, Smith’s Lawyers (smithslawyers.com.au), June 28, 2018; 2019 Report on the State of the Legal Market, Center on Ethics and the Legal Profession at Georgetown University Law School and Thomson Reuters Legal Executive Institute, January 2019 (“ headcount has grown consistently in recent years only among associates and senior/staff counsel. In all other categories – including equity partners, non-equity partners, and of counsel – firms have been steadily reducing headcount”.); Howard Levitt, I wouldn’t recommend my profession to anyone anymore. Here’s why, Financial Post, January 15, 2020; The Future of the Legal Profession, Law Society of Western Australia, December 12, 2017; Don Macaulay, Is Law School Worth It? Law Grads Answer, National Jurist, January 26, 2018.
[7] Bill Henderson, How Much Are Corporations In-Sourcing Legal Services?, Legal Evolution, May 2, 2017; Mark Cohen, Global Legal Tech is Transforming Service Delivery, Forbes, August 29, 2017; Jayne R. Reardon, Alternative Business Structures: Good for the Public, Good for the Lawyers, 7:2 St. Mary’s Journal on Legal Malpractice & Ethics 304, 2017; Altman Weil, Law Firms in Transition 2017: An Altman Weil Flash Survey (“Two-thirds of firms report losing business to corporate law department insourcing”; “19%” losing business to “non-law firm providers of legal and quasi-legal services”); Altman Weil, Law Firms in Transition 2016: An Altman Weil Flash Survey (“68% of law firms report they are losing business to corporate law departments”; “19% of law firms report they are losing business to non-law firm providers of legal and quasi-legal services”); Mark Cohen and Liam Brown, New Players driving value for legal departments, CBA National, October 2, 2017; ALM Intelligence and Morrison & Foerster, General Counsel Up-At-Night Report, 2017 (73% of legal work is performed in-house); Heather Suttie, The Next Decade of Legal Services: Embracing Law Market Change, Attorney at Work, January 15, 2020; Nicholas Bruch, The Trend to Watch: Forecasting the Future Direction of the Legal Market, American Lawyer, September 18, 2019; Alternative Legal Service Providers 2019: Fast growth, expanding use and increasing opportunity, Thomson Reuters (in partnership with Georgetown University’s Center on Ethics and the Legal Profession, University of Oxford Said Business School, and UK based Acritas), 2019; Neil Rose, Large law firms ‘increasingly losing out to Big 4’, Legal Futures, January 30, 2019. Also see generally, Jacob Morgan, The Future Leader: 9 Skills and Mindsets to Succeed in the Next Decade, John Wiley & Sons Inc., 2020.
[8] Paul Lippe, Disruption, eruption or interruption: 3 views of change in law, ABA Journal, July 31, 2014;
[9] Trish Hennessy and Ricardo Tranjan, No Safe Harbour: Precarious Work and Economic Insecurity Among Skilled Professionals in Canada, Canadian Center for Policy Alternatives, August 2018. See, James Bessen, Maarten Goos, Anna Solomons, and Wiljan van den Berge, Automation: A Guide for Policymakers, Brookings, January 2020.; Debra Cassens Weiss, Company that promised to revolutionize legal services confirms layoffs of most of its legal staff, ABA Journal, January 14, 2020.
[10] Caitlin Zaloom, Does the U.S. Still Have a ‘Middle Class’?: White-collar work today is fundamentally insecure, The Atlantic, November 4, 2018. Also see, Trish Hennessy and Ricardo Tranjan, No Safe Harbour: Precarious Work and Economic Insecurity Among Skilled Professionals in Canada, Canadian Center for Policy Alternatives, August 2018; Louis Hyman, Temp: How American Work, American Business, and the American Dream Became Temporary, Viking Press, 2018; Sandra Shutt, Despair ahead: Millennial lawyers and the legal job market, Canadian Lawyer, July 10, 2017; Christopher Banks, The American Legal Profession: The Myths and Realities of Practicing Law, CQ Press, 2018.
[11] Nicole Gibillini, ‘No safe harbour’ for Canadian professionals as survey reveals 22% in precarious jobs, BNN Bloomberg, August 21, 2018; Trish Hennessy and Ricardo Tranjan, No Safe Harbour: Precarious Work and Economic Insecurity Among Skilled Professionals in Canada, Canadian Center for Policy Alternatives, August 2018.
[12] Trish Hennessy and Ricardo Tranjan, No Safe Harbour: Precarious Work and Economic Insecurity Among Skilled Professionals in Canada, Canadian Center for Policy Alternatives, August 2018.
[13] Pavel Krapivin, What to Do When Your Career is Disrupted Later in Life, Forbes, January 3, 2020.
[14] Ash Buchanan, Complexity inside and out, Benefit Mindset (medium.com), August 22, 2017; Ash Buchanan, The nature of mindsets, Benefit Mindset (medium.com), March 16, 2017. Also see, Douglas Ready, Leadership Mindsets for the New Economy, MIT Sloan Management Review, November 6, 2019; Jacob Morgan, The Future Leader: 9 Skills and Mindsets to Succeed in the Next Decade, John Wiley & Sons Inc., 2020.
[15] Steve Blank, Why Companies Do ‘Innovation Theater’ Instead of Actual Innovation, Harvard Business Review, October 7, 2019.
[16] Eric Sigurdson, Alternative Business Structures, Competition, and Legal Services Delivery: The Case for ABSs v. the Legal Profession’s Monopoly in North America, Sigurdson Post, November 7, 2017; Legal Innovation Regulatory Survey: Executive Summary – The Ecosystem for the Regulation of Legal Services and Increasing Access to Justice, American Bar Association (legalinnovationregulatorysurvey.info), August 2019 (updated regularly); New ABA website details regulatory landscape for delivery of legal services in all 50 states, American Bar Association, August 6, 2019; Lourdes Slater, The why and how of legal innovation, LinkedIn, January 6, 2020; Andrew Arruda, Reregulation, Not Deregulation, IAALS Blog, University of Denver (iaals.du.edu), November 21, 2019; Joe Patrice, The Legal Profession Isn’t Overregulated It’s Just Badly Regulated, Above the Law, November 25, 2019; Mark Cohen, Why Re-Regulation And Equity Matter In Legal Delivery, Forbes, February 12, 2017; Thomas Alan and Marco Cillario, Regime Change – The scorched earth approach to legal education reform, Legal Business (legalbusiness-co-uk.cdn.ampproject.org), December 2019.
[17] Qian Hongdao, Sughra Bibi, Asif Khan, etal, Legal Technologies in Action: The Future of the Legal Market in Light of Disruptive Innovations, Sustainability, Vol. 11, Issue 4, 2019. Also see for example: Howard Levitt, I wouldn’t recommend my profession to anyone anymore. Here’s why, Financial Post, January 15, 2020.
[18] Eric Sigurdson, Alternative Business Structures, Competition, and Legal Services Delivery: The Case for ABSs v. the Legal Profession’s Monopoly in North America, Sigurdson Post, November 7, 2017; Anders Spile, How to build new pillars of the law firm, ABA Journal, January 30, 2020.
[19] Jonathan Brayne, The future of the in-house legal function: An Allen & Overy perspective on the opportunities and challenges ahead, Allen & Overy LLP (allenovery.com), 2019.
[20] Ari Kaplan, CEO discusses the disrupting, displacing and deconstructing of legal services, ABA Journal, January 24, 2020.
[21] Jack Mintz, Don’t reject change – manage its effects, Financial Post, January 2, 2020.
[22] Roy Strom, Despite Growth, Report Warns Market Shifting for Law Firms, Bloomberg Law, January 6, 2020.
[23] Steve Dennng, Why Big Firms Find It Hard To Innovate, Forbes, January 12, 2020; Hamlet Batista, Overcoming ‘Expert Bias’ in Order to Innovate, Entrepreneur, January 8, 2019.
[24] Jay Sekulow, The Importance of Having an Innovative Mindset as a Lawyer, Medium, April 18, 2018.
[25] Jack Mintz, Don’t reject change – manage its effects, Financial Post, January 2, 2020.
[26] John Sterling and John Remsen, Strategic Planning – It’s Not Just for ‘BigLaw’ Anymore, The Remsen Group, July 8, 2014.
[27] Reimagining the legal function report 2019: How legal functions are approaching a seismic operational shift, EY, 2019; Cornelius Grossmann, Why the legal function must be reimagined for the digital age, EY.com, June 17, 2019; Christine Simmons, Elite Law Firms Are Quietly Outsourcing High-Value Functions. How Far Will They Go?, The American Lawyer, January 6, 2020; Jaap Bosman, 5 trends that will define the new decade for law firms, LinkedIn, January 10, 2020; Heather Suttie, The Next Decade of Legal Services, Pt. 2: Managing Law Market Change, Attorney at Work, January 22, 2020; Anders Spile, How to build new pillars of the law firm, ABA Journal, January 30, 2020.
[28] Alison Laird, Is BigLaw Innovation Redundant?, LinkedIn, January 7, 2020.
[29] Mark Cohen, The practice of law vs the business of law, Modern Law Magazine, Issue 46, December 30, 2019.
[30] Dal Bhathal, The Future for Lawyers: Opportunities and Challenges, The Counsel Network, January 3, 2018.
[31] Jordan Furlong, Law is a Buyer’s Market: Building a Client-First Law Firm, Law21 Press, 2017; Jack Newton, The Client-Centered Law Firm: How to Succeed in an Experience-Driven World, Themis Solutions Inc., 2020; Mark Cohen, Holiday Wish List for the Legal Industry, Forbes, December 23, 2019; Bob Ambrogi, The Decade in Legal Tech: The 10 Most Significant Developments (2010-2019), Law Sites (lawsitesblog.com), January 1, 2020.
[32] 2019 Report on the State of the Legal Market, Center on Ethics and the Legal Profession at Georgetown University Law School and Thomson Reuters Legal Executive Institute, January 2019. Also see, Joel Barolsky, Three reasons why premium law firms are losing market share, Financial Review, April 4, 2019.
[33] Roy Strom, Despite Growth, Report Warns Market Shifting for Law Firms, Bloomberg Law, January 6, 2020. Also see, Heather Suttie, The Next Decade of Legal Services: Embracing Law Market Change, Attorney at Work, January 15, 2020 (“While 2019 was a good financial year for many legal service providers – traditional law firms in particular – smart firms are embracing change …”). But see, Jen Dezso, Navigating Changes in US Spending with Outside Counsel, Acritas, January 2020 (“Spending with law firms is growing. Maybe-ish” – Jennifer Dezso, LinkedIn); Canadian legal landscape 2019: Issues and trends facing in-house counsel in Canada, Deloitte, 219 (“The CLOs we surveyed … expecting to maintain or decrease their external legal spend in the coming years.”); David Thomas, A ‘Very, Very Good Year’ for Law Firms? Maybe So, but Not for Everyone, American Lawyer, November 25, 2019; Stephen Poor, Big Law: How to Survive the Next Downturn, Bloomberg Law, March 2, 2018 (“there is increased stratification in the industry – the super rich law firms are growing profits faster than the rest of the market. This certainly reflects the continued distinction buyers are drawing between routine legal work and bespoke, complex work”).
[34] Roy Strom, Despite Growth, Report Warns Market Shifting for Law Firms, Bloomberg Law, January 6, 2020; Debra Cassens Weiss, ‘Fundamental shift’ is transforming the delivery of legal services, new report concludes, ABA Journal, January 6, 2020; Cassandra Maas, ‘Revolutionary changes afoot’ in market for legal services: report, Jurist, January 7, 2020.
[35] Mark Cohen, Global Legal Tech is Transforming Service Delivery, Forbes, August 29, 2017; Jayne R. Reardon, Alternative Business Structures: Good for the Public, Good for the Lawyers, 7:2 St. Mary’s Journal on Legal Malpractice & Ethics 304, 2017; Altman Weil, Law Firms in Transition 2017: An Altman Weil Flash Survey (“Two-thirds of firms report losing business to corporate law department insourcing”; “19%” losing business to “non-law firm providers of legal and quasi-legal services”); Altman Weil, Law Firms in Transition 2016: An Altman Weil Flash Survey (“68% of law firms report they are losing business to corporate law departments”; “19% of law firms report they are losing business to non-law firm providers of legal and quasi-legal services”); Mark Cohen and Liam Brown, New Players driving value for legal departments, CBA National, October 2, 2017; ALM Intelligence and Morrison & Foerster, General Counsel Up-At-Night Report, 2017 (73% of legal work is performed in-house).
[36] 2020 Report on the State of the Legal Market, Center on Ethics and the Legal Profession at Georgetown University Law School and Thomson Reuters Legal Executive Institute, January 2020. Also see, Heather Suttie, The Next Decade of Legal Services: Embracing Law Market Change, Attorney at Work, January 15, 2020; Alternative Legal Service Providers 2019: Fast growth, expanding use and increasing opportunity, Thomson Reuters (in partnership with Georgetown University’s Center on Ethics and the Legal Profession, University of Oxford Said Business School, and UK based Acritas), 2019; Craig Wirth, Forum Magazine: A Safe Space for Innovation – Law Firms Creating ‘Captive ALSPs’, Legal Executive Institute, July 8, 2019; Anders Spile, How to build new pillars of the law firm, ABA Journal, January 30, 2020; Eric Sigurdson, The Evolving Legal Service Delivery Model: A 2018 Survival Guild for BigLaw and Traditional Law Firms – building a new business model, Sigurdson Post, January 14, 2018; Jeffrey Lowe, BigLaw 2016: A Look Ahead, Law360, January 12, 2016; 2018 Industry Outlook, Major, Lindsey & Africa, 2017; Peter Colin, The Lessons of Atrium: Innovation is Messy as Borders Blur Between Law Firms & Tech Companies, Thomson Reuters (legalexecutiveinstitute.com), January 16, 2020; Nicholas Bruch, The Trend to Watch: Forecasting the Future Direction of the Legal Market, American Lawyer, September 18, 2019; Neil Rose, Large law firms ‘increasingly losing out to Big 4’, Legal Futures, January 30, 2019; Joshua Kubicki, The Emerging Competitive Frontier in BigLaw is Practice Venturing: law firms as platforms, partners as customers, and building captive alternative models, Medium, January 24, 2019; Heather Suttie, The Next Decade of Legal Services, Pt. 2: Managing Law Market Change, Attorney at Work, January 22, 2020.
[37] Eric Sigurdson, Alternative Business Structures, Competition, and Legal Services Delivery: The Case for ABSs v. the Legal Profession’s Monopoly in North America, Sigurdson Post, November 7, 2017; Eric Sigurdson, The Evolving Legal Service Delivery Model: A 2018 Survival Guild for BigLaw and Traditional Law Firms – building a new business model, Sigurdson Post, January 14, 2018.
[38] Cassandra Maas, ‘Revolutionary changes afoot’ in market for legal services: report, Jurist, January 7, 2020.
[39] Megan Carpenter (editor), Entrepreneurship and Innovation in Evolving Economies: The Role of Law, Edward Elgar Publishing Limited, 2012 (Shubha Ghosh, Chapter 5: The strategic lawyer, page 63-78; Legal Department 2025: Overcoming lawyers’ resistance to change, Thomson Reuters (legal.thomsonreuters.com).
[40] Jae Um, Outwit, Outplay, Outlast: A Post-Recession View of the Survivors, The American Lawyer, June 20, 2018; James Clear, 5 Common Mental Errors That Sway You From Making Good Decisions, jamesclear.com, 2015; Buster Benson, Fighting Fallacy: You are almost definitely not living in reality because your brain doesn’t what you to, Quartz, September 16, 2016; Nick Romeo, Minding the Mindset, Gulf Times, December 29, 2016; Bill Schmarzo, Data Analytics and Human Heuristics: How to Avoid Making Poor Decisions, Dell Technologies, March 19, 2018.
[41] Louis Frapporti, The Ravages of the Legal Industry’s Solipism, LinkedIn, December 31, 2019.
[42] 2019 Report on the State of the Legal Market, Center on Ethics and the Legal Profession at Georgetown University Law School and Thomson Reuters Legal Executive Institute, January 2019.
[43] Roy Strom, Despite Growth, Report Warns Market Shifting for Law Firms, Bloomberg Law, January 6, 2020.
[44] What future-ready leaders do differently, Human Resources (humanresourcesonline.net), June 21, 2018.
[45] David Curle, Lessons from Legaltech: It’s Not About Legal Tech, Thomson Reuters, February 4, 2019. Also see, Susan Hackett, Who Are the ‘Unprofessional’ Players in Today’s Market, Corporate Counsel, April 12, 2019.
[46] Mark Cohen, New Business Models – Not Technology – Will Transform the Legal Industry, Forbes, November 8, 2018.
[47] Eric Sigurdson, The Evolving Legal Service Delivery Model: A 2018 Survival Guild for BigLaw and Traditional Law Firms – building a new business model, Sigurdson Post, January 14, 2018; Jonathan Walfisz, The New Model – how the traditional law firm model is evolving, World Trademark Review, January 2, 2020; Mark Cohen, Are Law Firms Sustainable? It’s the Model that Matters, Forbes, August 19, 2019; Michael Burne, A New Year’s Evolution: Is the Traditional Law Firm Model Finished …?, Artificial Lawyer, December 20, 2018; Travelers roundtable: change must come to the legal sector … and come quickly, The Lawyer, September 20, 2019; 2019 Report on the State of the Legal Market, Center on Ethics and the Legal Profession at Georgetown University Law School and Thomson Reuters Legal Executive Institute, January 2019.
[48] Ken Grady, My Thoughts On 2018 Report on the State of the Legal Market, The Algorithmic Society, January 11, 2018; Eric Sigurdson, The Evolving Legal Service Delivery Model: A 2018 Survival Guild for BigLaw and Traditional Law Firms – building a new business model, Sigurdson Post, January 14, 2018. See, Jen Dezso, Navigating Changes in US Spending with Outside Counsel, Acritas, January 2020 (“Spending with law firms is growing. Maybe-ish” – Jennifer Dezso, LinkedIn); Canadian legal landscape 2019: Issues and trends facing in-house counsel in Canada, Deloitte, 219 (“The CLOs we surveyed … expecting to maintain or decrease their external legal spend in the coming years.”); David Thomas, A ‘Very, Very Good Year’ for Law Firms? Maybe So, but Not for Everyone, American Lawyer, November 25, 2019; Stephen Poor, Big Law: How to Survive the Next Downturn, Bloomberg Law, March 2, 2018 (“there is increased stratification in the industry – the super rich law firms are growing profits faster than the rest of the market. This certainly reflects the continued distinction buyers are drawing between routine legal work and bespoke, complex work”).
[49] Eric Sigurdson, The Evolving Legal Service Delivery Model: A 2018 Survival Guild for BigLaw and Traditional Law Firms – building a new business model, Sigurdson Post, January 14, 2018. Also see, Mark Cohen, Differentiation in the New Legal Marketplace and Why it Matters, Forbes, January 2, 2018.
[50] 2018 Industry Outlook, Major, Lindsey & Africa, 2017. Also see, Eric Sigurdson, General Counsel, Chief Legal Officers & In-House Counsel: Five New Year’s Resolutions – Leadership, Operations, Metrics, Technology, and External Counsel, Sigurdson Post, December 13, 2016.
[51] Ken Callander, Value-Based Pricing of Legal Services, Above the Law, June 17, 2019; John Chisholm, Why and how to switch to value pricing, Remaking Law Firms, January 17, 2019; Meg McEvoy, Analysis: Law Firms Respond to Demand for Alt. Fee Models, Bloomberg Law, June 17, 2019.
[52] Dal Bhathal, The Future for Lawyers: Opportunities and Challenges, The Counsel Network, January 3, 2018.
[53] Kourtney Whitehead, 3 Career Moves You Need to Prioritize To Protect Your Livelihood in the 20s, Forbes, December 29, 2019.
[54] Jonathan Kash, The Coming Storm in Legal Services, LinkedIn, August 28, 2019.
[55] Daniel Katz, Key Aspects of Innovation in the Legal Industry, IE University (ie.edu), August 29, 2019.
[56] Zach Warren, The Future of Legal Tech is About Transformation, Not Automation, American Lawyer, January 15, 2020.
[57] Peter Bregman, If You Want to Get Better at Something, Ask Yourself These Two Questions, Harvard Business Review, November 9, 2018.
[58] Legal Department 2025: Overcoming lawyers’ resistance to change, Thomson Reuters (legal.thomsonreuters.com).
[59] Sydney Finkelstein, Don’t Be Blinded by Your Own Expertise, Harvard Business Review, May-June 2019; Brian Tang, Lawyers Must Adopt Three Mindsets to Succeed in the Technology Age, Hong Kong Lawyer, August 2019.
[60] Emily Foges, Insight: U.S. Adoption of Legal Tech Lags Behind Europe, But Set to Grow, Bloomberg Law, December 24, 2019; Daniel Katz, Key Aspects of Innovation in the Legal Industry, IE University (ie.edu), August 29, 2019.
[61] Heather Suttie, No ‘Alternatives’ Anymore, HeatherSuttie.ca, February 2, 2019; Heather Suttie, Legal Market Strategies for Uncertain Times, HeatherSuttie.ca, September 4, 2019; Heather Suttie, The Next Decade of Legal Services, Pt. 2: Managing Law Market Change, Attorney at Work, January 22, 2020.
[62] Benjamin Barton, The Law School Crash: What’s worse than a decade of financial turmoil? Not learning from it, Chronicle, January 3, 2020.
[63] Susan Duncan, Countdown to 2020: A Recap of 2019 Best Ideas and Tips, Rainmaking Oasis, December 18, 2019 – “on innovation”.
[64] Robert French, The fuzziness of mindsets: Divergent conceptualizations and characterizations of mindset theory and praxis, International Journal of Organizational Analysis, Vol. 24, Issue 4, 2016; Gil Broza, Agile Mind-Set: Making Agile Processes Work, 3P Vantage Media, 2015; Steve Denning, Understanding the Agile Mindset, Forbes, August 13, 2019; Pedro Marata, Creating Tangible Mind Shifts: The Different Types of Mindsets, Medium, June 5, 2018. Also see for example, Jacob Morgan, The Future Leader: 9 Skills and Mindsets to Succeed in the Next Decade, John Wiley & Sons Inc., 2020.
[65] Brian Tang, Lawyers Must Adopt Three Mindsets to Succeed in the Technology Age, Hong Kong Lawyer, August 2019.
[66] Emergent thinking (or ‘intelligent opportunism’) is the idea that, although strategic thinking is inherently concerned with shaping and reshaping strategic intent, there must be room for flexibility – an integration of both strategic and entrepreneurial thinking (both based on the theory of ‘effectuation’) – thus allowing leadership and organizations to consider new opportunities. Emergent thinking is about entrepreneurial leadership, adopting a flexible approach to strategy in order to take advantage of emerging strategies and new opportunities (that may be arguably more relevant in a rapidly changing business environment) and, by being ‘intelligently opportunistic’, can positively influence strategic decision making for the benefit of the organization. See: Peter Ginter, W. Jack Duncan, and Linda Swayne, Strategic Management of Health Care Organizations (8th edition), John Wiley & Sons, 2018; Sebastian Fixson and Jay Rao, Learning Emergent Strategies through Design Thinking, Design Management Review, Vol. 25, Issue 1, Spring 2014; Antonio Dottore and David Corkindale, Towards a Theory of Business Model Adaptation, Regional Frontiers of Entrepreneurship Research 2009: 6th International Australian Graduate School Entrepreneurship Research Exchange, Swinburne University of Technology, Australia, 2009; Walter Brenner and Falk Uebernickel, Design Thinking for Innovation: Research and Practice, Springer International Publishing, 2016; Marko Matalamaki, Effectuation, an emerging theory of entrepreneurship – towards a mature stage of the development, Journal of Small Business and Enterprise Development, Vol. 24, Issue 4, 2017; Steven Pattinson, Strategic Thinking: intelligent opportunism and emergent strategy – the case of Strategic Engineering Services, International Journal of Entrepreneurship and Innovation, Volume 7, No. 1, 2016:
“The purpose of strategic thinking, it has been suggested, is to: ‘discover novel, imaginative strategies which can re-write the rules of the competitive game; and to envision potential futures significantly different from the present’ (Heracleous, 1998, p 485). Strategic thinking is an essential prerequisite to firms’ survival (Beaver and Ross, 2000). More recently, strategic thinking has been related to the innovative aspects of a firm’s strategic planning (Harrison and St John, 2013). However, Mintzberg and Waters (1985) recognize that not all strategy is consciously planned, referring to ‘emergent strategy’ that is often developed intuitively by entrepreneurs rather than as the result of rational planning (Hill et al, 2014). The notion of emergent strategy is closely linked to the theory of ‘effectuation’ (Sarasvathy, 2001): that is, the notion that entrepreneurship is a way of thinking, reasoning and acting that focuses on the identification and exploitation of business opportunities from a broad general perspective, which Sarasvathy (2004) describes as the ‘essential agent’ of entrepreneurship. Entrepreneurship is, therefore, associated with opportunity recognition and has been defined as the: ‘examination of how, by whom, and with what effects opportunities to create future goods and services are discovered, evaluated and exploited’ (Shane and Venkataraman, 2000, p 218), and the ability to recognize opportunities is widely viewed as a key step in the entrepreneurial process (Tang and Khan, 2007). The purpose of strategic thinking, on the other hand, is to clarify the future, allocate and manage resources and manage change (Thompson et al, 2014). However, to create the most value, entrepreneurial firms also need to act strategically, and this calls for an integration of both entrepreneurial and strategic thinking (Hitt et al, 2001), as Zahra and Nambisan (2012, p 219) explain: ‘Strategic thinking and the entrepreneurial activities … influence one another in a cycle that perpetuates and even sparks innovation’. The question is, how can these two concepts be successfully combined?
The concept of ‘intelligent opportunism’ refers to the idea that, although strategic thinking is inherently concerned with shaping and reshaping strategic intent, there must be room for flexibility (Hamel and Prahalad, 1989), thus allowing entrepreneurs to consider new opportunities. Intelligent opportunism involves entrepreneurs being open to new experiences that allow them to take advantage of emergent strategies that are, arguably, more relevant in a rapidly changing business environment and can be considered a form of ‘opportunistic’ strategy (Liedtka, 1998). … Intelligent opportunism is about adopting a flexible approach to strategy in order to take advantage of emerging strategies and new opportunities and, by being ‘intelligently opportunistic’, entrepreneurial leaders can influence strategic decision making (Haycock, 2012).”
Also see: Refilwe Mauda, The influence and causation strategies on corporate innovation in conditions of increased industry uncertainty, A research report re Master of Business Administration requirements, Gordon Institute of Business Science, University of Pretoria, January 13, 2015; Laura Paulina Mathiaszyk, Corporate Effectuation: Effectual Strategy for Corporate Management, Inaugural Dissertation for Doctor rerum oeconomicarum, Faculty of Economics, Schumpeter School of Business and Economics, University of Wuppertal, June 2017; Jeroen oude Luttikhuis, Effectuation and Causation: The Effect of “Entrepreneurial Experience” and “Market Uncertainty”: An Analysis of Causation and Effectuation in Business Plans, Master Thesis (MSc Business Administration), May 20, 2014; Andre Hermes, Causation and effectuation vs. analysis and intuition: conceptual parallels in the context of entrepreneurial decision-making, 7th IBA Bachelor Thesis Conference, July 1, 2016 (Faculty of Behavioural, Management, and Social Sciences).
[67] Alain Fayolle and Olivier Toutain, Four Educational Principles to Rethink Ethically Entrepreneurship Education, Revista De Economia Mundial, Vol. 35, 2013. Also see, David Wilkinson, Increasing organisational performance through entrepreneurship: entrepreneurship isn’t a job … it’s a mindset, Organisational Development (oxford-review.com).test
[68] Eric Sigurdson, Strategic Management and Leadership: From the Legal Industry to Financial Services to Healthcare: ‘what got you here won’t get you there’, Sigurdson Post, July 30, 2018; Alain Fayolle and Olivier Toutain, Four Educational Principles to Rethink Ethically Entrepreneurship Education, Revista De Economia Mundial, Vol. 35, 2013.
[69] See, Eric Sigurdson, Strategic Management and Leadership – From the Legal Industry to Financial Services to Healthcare: “what got you here won’t get you there”, Sigurdson Post, July 30, 2018; Eric Sigurdson, An Integrated Approach to Strategy Implementation and Change Management – Form the Legal Industry to Financial Services to Healthcare: ‘a fundamental leadership and management skillset’, Sigurdson Post, August 21, 2018.
[70] Alain Fayolle and Olivier Toutain, Four Educational Principles to Rethink Ethically Entrepreneurship Education, Revista De Economia Mundial, Vol. 35, 2013; Meranda Vieyra, When it Comes to Business Development for Young Lawyers, Motive and Mindset Matter, National Law Review, April 15, 2019.
[71] Eric Sigurdson, Strategic Management and Leadership: From the Legal Industry to Financial Services to Healthcare: ‘what got you here won’t get you there’, Sigurdson Post, July 30, 2018; Eric Sigurdson, An Integrated Approach to Strategy Implementation and Change Management – From the Legal Industry to Financial Services to Health Care: ‘a fundamental leadership and management skillset’, Sigurdson Post, August 31, 2018.
[72] Legal Department 2025: Overcoming lawyers’ resistance to change, Thomson Reuters (legal.thomsonreuters.com); Fearless Confidence and the Growth Mindset: It’s time to uproot a mindset that often breeds fear and stasis in lawyers, Above the Law, August 22, 2017; Allison Wolf, Grit and Growth for Embracing a Life of Learning and Challenge, Slaw, December 11, 2015; Peter Schroeder, How Lifelong Learning and a Growth Mindset Can Propel Your Career, StartUpGrind (medium.com), December 5, 2017; Knowledge@Wharton, Here’s how you can make yourself irreplaceable in tomorrow’s job market, World Economic Forum, July 5, 2019; Niki Iliadis, Learning to Learn: The Future-Proof Skill, Big Innovation Centre, APPG on AI, and KPMG, 2018; Erin Kurchina, Resolution 2019: Develop The Growth Mindset of a Lifelong Learner, Digitalist Magazine, January 22, 2019; Carol Dweck, Mindset: The New Psychology of Success, Random House, 2006 (updated edition: 2016 Ballantine Books); Joseph Aoun, Robot-Proof: Higher Education in the Age of Artificial Intelligence, MIT Press, 2017.
[73] Courtney Subramanian, Alvin Toffler: What he got right – and wrong, BBC News, July 1, 2016; Alex Johnson, ‘Future Shock’ Author Alvin Toffler Dies at 87, NBC News, June 29, 2016.
[74] David Jones, Why creativity is a powerful leadership tool and how to embrace it, CEO magazine (theceomagazine.com), November 29, 2019.
[75] Mark Cohen, Holiday Wish List for the Legal Industry, Forbes, December 23, 2019. Also see, Bob Ambrogi, The Decade in Legal Tech: The 10 Most Significant Developments (2010-2019), Law Sites (lawsitesblog.com), January 1, 2020.
[76] Jayne Reardon, A Whole New Mindset for Lawyers, ARAG Legal (araglegal.com), 2017.
[77] Jay Harrington, 10 Maxims to Make Your Law Firm Marketing Better Next Year, Attorney at Work, December 2019.
[78] Mark Cohen, Holiday Wish List for the Legal Industry, Forbes, December 23, 2019.
[79] Susan Duncan, Countdown to 2020: A Recap of 2019 Best Ideas and Tips, Rainmaking Oasis, December 18, 2019 – “on growth strategy”.
[80] Jordan Furlong, The rise of the lawyer, Law Twenty One, September 5, 2019; Paul Gilbert, Lawyering With Purpose: How Doing the Right Thing Can Make Your Career Thrive, Lawyers on Demand (lodlaw.com), July 12, 2018.
[81] Mark Cohen, Holiday Wish List for the Legal Industry, Forbes, December 23, 2019.
[82] Monica Zent, Why Every Lawyer Should Adopt An Innovation Mindset, Above the Law, August 12, 2018; Jay Sekulow, The Importance of Having an Innovative Mindset as a Lawyer, Medium, April 18, 2018; David Jones, Why creativity is a powerful leadership tool and how to embrace it, CEO magazine (theceomagazine.com), November 29, 2019.
[83] See for example: Rich Lesser, Martin Reeves, and Kevin Whitaker, 5 ways for business leaders to win in the 2020s, World Economic Forum, January 2, 2019; Mark Beese, Design Thinking Mindsets that are Counter-Intuitive for Lawyers, LinkedIn, January 9, 2020; Mark Beese, How Design Thinking Makes for Good Business Development and Client Service in Legal, LinkedIn, January 9, 2020; Jon Kolko, Design Thinking Comes of Age, Harvard Business Review, September 2015.
[84] See for example: Rich Lesser, Martin Reeves, and Kevin Whitaker (Boston Consulting Group), 5 ways for business leaders to win in the 2020s, World Economic Forum, January 2, 2019.
[85] See, for example: Carolyn Dewar, Martin Hirt, and Scott Keller, The mindsets and practices of excellent CEOs, McKinsey & Company, October 2019.
[86] David Cunningham, Optimizing Legal Ops in law firms, Legal Evolution, September 15, 2019; Susan Bokermann, Analysis: Law Firms Poised to Steal the Operations Spotlight, Bloomberg Law, November 4, 2019; Monica Zent, 5 Reasons Why Legal Ops Rules, Medium, September 9, 2016; Mark Cohen, Legal Operations is Hot. But Legal Culture is Lukewarm Toward It, Law.com, May 15, 2018.
[87] Bob Ambrogi, The Decade in Legal Tech: The 10 Most Significant Developments (2010-2019), Law Sites (lawsitesblog.com), January 1, 2020.
[88] Karel Dorner and David Edelman, What ‘digital’ really means, McKinsey & Company, July 2015.
[89] Paul Hooper, Digital Transformation Starts With the CEO: It’s Time To Say Yes To Change, Forbes, December 23, 2019; Uptake of artificial intelligence by in-house teams, International Bar Association (ibanet.org), September 30, 2019; Futureproofing the law firm from disruption, Valtech.com, September 13, 2016; Digital workplaces are the future for the legal industry, Lexology, June 12, 2019; Going beyond risk and compliance: Legal functions embracing digital, Deloitte, 2018; Mark Cohen, Law is Lagging Digital Transformation – Why it Matters, Forbes, December 20, 2018; Olga Mack, Modern General Counsel: Technology Is A Must, Above the Law, August 26, 2019; Clint Boulton, What is digital transformation? A necessary disruption, CIO.com, May 31, 2019; What is Digital Transformation, and is it Really Worth the Risk?, Outsource IT Computing (oitc.ca), 2019; Once Listed Firm Slater & Gordon Bags £10m Funds, To Invest in Consumer Tools + Outcome Prediction, Artificial Lawyer, January 15, 2020; Alan Murray and Katherine Dunn, Every Company is a Digital Company, Fortune, January 13, 2020; Qian Hongdao, Sughra Bibi, Asif Khan, etal, Legal Technologies in Action: The Future of the Legal Market in Light of Disruptive Innovations, Sustainability, Vol. 11, Issue 4, 2019; Legal Technology Future Horizons: Strategic Imperatives for the Law Firm of the Future, International Legal Technology Association, 2014.
[90] Mark Cohen, Holiday Wish List for the Legal Industry, Forbes, December 23, 2019; Rob MacAdam, Legal Tech Roadmap: Where to Start Your Technology Journey, ACC Docket, July 16, 2019; Olga Mack, Beyond the ‘AI’ Buzzword: 5 Questions to Ask About Your Legal Tech Solution, ACC Docket, January 15, 2020.
[91] Eric Sigurdson, The Evolving Legal Service Delivery Model: A 2018 Survival Guild for BigLaw and Traditional Law Firms – building a new business model, Sigurdson Post, January 14, 2018.
[92] Paul Rawlinson, Will lawyers become extinct in the age of automation?, World Economic Forum, March 29, 2018.
[93] Karel Dorner and David Edelman, What ‘digital’ really means, McKinsey & Company, July 2015.
[94] Kevin McKeown, Mindset Matters: Lawyers Who Lead Well Are Receptive to Change: Are the leaders running your law business effective?, Above the Law, August 7, 2014.
[95] Allison Bailey, Martin Reeves, Kevin Whitaker, and Rich Hutchinson, Winning the ‘20s: Company of the Future, BCG Henderson Institute, 2019; Jack Fuller, Michael Jacobides, and Martin Reeves, The Myths and Realities of Business Ecosystems, MIT Sloan Management Review, February 25, 2019.
[96] For example, see Anndam Bhattacharya, Martin Reeves, Nilolaus Lang, Rajah Augustinraj, New Business Models for a New Global Landscape, BCG Henderson Institute, November 14, 2017.
[97] Eric Sigurdson, The Evolving Legal Service Delivery Model: A 2018 Survival Guild for BigLaw and Traditional Law Firms – building a new business model, Sigurdson Post, January 14, 2018.
[98] Kourtney Whitehead, 3 Career Moves You Need to Prioritize To Protect Your Livelihood in the 20s, Forbes, December 29, 2019.
[99] Sandee Magliozzi, How Moving from ‘Best’ to ‘Next’ Practices Can Fuel Innovation, Santa Clara Law Faculty Publications, November 2015.
[100] Steve Blank, Why Companies Do ‘Innovation Theater’ Instead of Actual Innovation, Harvard Business Review, October 7, 2019.
[101] Anthony Hilton, Why their profession’s failures mean lawyers don’t win top city jobs, Evening Standard, UK, September 22, 2016. Also see, Mark Cohen, The practice of law vs the business of law, Modern Law Magazine, Issue 46, December 30, 2019.
[102] The Fourth Industrial Revolution, or 4IR, is the fourth major industrial era since the initial Industrial Revolution of the 18th century. The Fourth Industrial Revolution can be described as a range of new technologies that are fusing the physical, digital and biological worlds, and impacting all disciplines, economies and industries. At its core is the combination of big data, analytics and physical technology – providing increasingly enhanced, customized offerings to help meet the needs of organizations and individuals that can adapt and evolve to changing situations and requirements over time. Central to this revolution are emerging technology breakthroughs in fields such as artificial intelligence, robotics, the Internet of Things, autonomous vehicles, 3D printing and nanotechnology. Moreover, it is disrupting almost every industry in every country. And the breadth and depth of these changes herald the transformation of entire systems of production, management, and governance. Business leaders and senior executives and their trusted business and legal advisors need to understand their changing environment, challenge the assumptions of operating teams, and relentlessly innovate. See, Klaus Schwab, The Fourth Industrial Revolution: what it means, how to respond, World Economic Forum, January 14, 2016; Irving Wladawsky-Berger, The Fourth Industrial Revolution: Risks and Benefits, Wall Street Journal, February 24, 2017; Ernst & Young, What is the Fourth Industrial Revolution? How will it affect business and society, EY (betterworkingworld.ey.com); Hugh Son, JP Morgan Software Does in Seconds What Took Lawyers 360,000 Hours, Bloomberg, February 27, 2017; Alex Gray, The 10 skills you need to thrive in the Fourth Industrial Revolution, World Economic Forum, January 19, 2016.
[103] Mark Cohen, ‘Legal Innovation’ is not an Oxymoron – It’s Farther Along Than you Think, Forbes, March 14, 2017.
[104] Mark Cohen, Law’s Looming Skills Crisis, Forbes, May 21, 2019.
[105] Leigh Murrin, There’s no place for ‘tick the box’ mindsets, in-house lawyers of the future, The Lawyer, October 24, 2017.
[106] Meranda Vieyra, When It Comes to Business Development For Young Lawyers, Motives and Mindset Matter, National Law Review, April 15, 2019.
[107] Eric Sigurdson, The Evolving Legal Service Delivery Model: A 2018 Survival Guild for BigLaw and Traditional Law Firms – building a new business model, Sigurdson Post, January 14, 2018.
[108] The Future Ready Lawyer: The Global Future of Law, Wolters Kluwer, 2019.
[109] Mark Cohen, Are Law Firms Sustainable? It’s the Model That Matters, Forbes, August 19, 2019.
[110] Pavel Krapivin, What to Do When Your Career is Disrupted Later in Life, Forbes, January 3, 2020.
[111] Peter Bregman, If You Want to Get Better at Something, Ask Yourself These Two Questions, Harvard Business Review, November 9, 2018.
[112] Harvey Schacther, Have a ‘hardy’ new year – and be better able to deal with stress because of it, Globe and Mail, January 2, 2020.
[113] Mark Cohen, The New Legal Career, Forbes, June 5, 2017.
