Yesterday, I was honored to serve as a facilitator at DataCert’s Generals of the Revolution program in Houston. This series of programs features Professor Richard Susskind, author of the brilliant book, The End of Lawyers? I have worked with Richard on panels and have heard him speak many times. He makes a compelling case for impending radical change in our profession, and he has a track record of accuracy in his predictions. Remember back in 1996 when he predicted that email would become the standard manner by which lawyers and clients would communicate? Most lawyers thought the idea absurd, some even wanted him banned from the profession. How’s that working out for those lawyers? I’m betting that event he most ardent critics then now use email regularly when communicating with their clients.
So here’s the deal. Richard is not some wild-eyed wacko sitting in a ivory tower somewhere imaging the future while in some hallucinogenic trance. He speaks with leading General Counsel from around the world, consults not only to law firms but also other consultancies that lead the legal profession in terms of adaption and change and gathers insights from those discussions as well. So what’s on his mind now? Here’s his premise: General Counsel face the following problems. First, pressure to reduce head count. Second, pressure to reduce external spend, in some cases up to 50%. And three, handle more and riskier work, including compliance issues that become more complex as the world becomes smaller for the business. In the face of these challenges, there are only two responses: greater efficiency (cutting costs) and collaboration (share the costs).
Based on this as well as the growing power of technology and the fact that the marginal cost of information tends toward zero, lawyers need to become specials at process management (not project management–more on that later), which is the ability to take a series of tasks and deconstruct them to their core constituents and decide what resources are most appropriately applied to each. The easiest illustration might be using one firm to do document discovery while another does the trial.
Richard likes to relate that after most of his speeches, lawyers will come up to him and comment about how everything he says seems so true, except for X practice area, which, shockingly, happens to be that person’s practice area. Lawyers, being who and what we are, argue about the leaves instead of seeing the forest.
Maybe Richard is slightly wrong–he certainly does not have that track record, mind you–but don’t we all need to ask ourselves, "what if he’s right?" If he’s right and we do nothing, we have only ourselves to blame for our eventual demise (our our firm’s). If we realize he’s right only after it becomes apparent to everyone, it will be too late. If he ask yourself "what if he’s right?" any sound leader will come up with a strategy for change.
As for the future? One of my favorite Richard lines is something like this: "The future is here. It just arrives at some places sooner than others."