Read on Twitter
Ten years ago, in an end-of-the-2000s blog post at Law21, I wrote: "Whether we’re ready for it or not, we’re entering the Decade of the Client, probably the first of many." https://www.law21.ca/2009/12/ready-or-not-here-come-the-clients/. Did that turn out to be accurate?
Two items in the last 24 hours help provide an answer. 1: The world's largest law firm calls the traditional firm model "backward-looking," describes the Big 4 as an existential threat, and intends to grow to 10,000 lawyers under a new partnership plan: https://www.legalfutures.co.uk/latest-news/times-up-on-big-law-firm-model-says-dentons
And 2: The founder of a legal AI company, who also served on a California state bar task force that recommended massive changes to legal regulation, writes this compelling post calling for a complete reconsideration of our regulatory models: https://iaals.du.edu/blog/reregulation-not-deregulation @AndrewArruda
I think lawyers spent the 2010s coming to accept that the rise of client power and the development of amazing legal technology have rendered obsolete our old assumptions about and structures for legal services delivery. It was a decade-long trip through the five stages of grief.
I think the 2020s will be the decade in which the new legal economy ( https://www.law21.ca/2019/09/the-new-legal-economy/) shifts into gear. The transition period will end, the new parameters of legal services will become clear, and everyone will get busy #MakingLawBetter for clients, lawyers, and society.
If you believe the law has experienced a wild ride of change these last ten years, I want to tell you that compared to what's coming, it's been the bumpy, meandering path of an airplane taxiing to its runway. But now, we're finally ready for departure. Fasten your seat belts. //
