Legal practice is shrinking. Legal delivery is expanding. Practice is no longer synonymous with delivery. In fact, practice is returning to what it once was: rendering high-value service that solves client challenges. It's deja vu all over again--but different. Here's why and how.
. That requires different workforces, processes, technology platforms, reward systems, organizational structures, capital and capabilities from traditional law firms. It also requires client-centricity and an alignment with business that is generally lacking among law firms. Translation: it’s easier announced than delivered, especially when the law companies are led by law firm partners whose careers have been forged in different structural and economic models.
Lawyers in the early and middle-stages of their careers are caught in the shifting currents of law’s transformation. Legal knowledge is becoming a skill to be leveraged with new competencies. It is no longer, by itself, sufficient to forge a successful legal career. Most mid-career lawyers tend to be resistant to change even as the necessity to do so becomes more acute by the day. Older lawyers are riding out the change storm and banking they will make it until retirement.
How did we get here and are legal careers for most a dead end? Spoiler alert: there’s tremendous opportunity in the legal industry. The caveat: all lawyers must have basic business and technological competency whether they pursue practice careers or leverage their legal knowledge as a skill in legal delivery and/or allied professional careers.legal practice? It is rendering service to clients competently, zealously and within legal and ethical boundaries.
Legal practice was the presumptive career path of most lawyers for generations. As law firms grew—especially from the 1970’s-the global financial crisis of 2007--fewer lawyers had direct client interaction. Client skills eroded, and the legalturned inward. The attorney’s supervisor became the client proxy. Most lawyers were unaware of the clients’ objectives, risk tolerance, and business challenges.
Generations of lawyers—especially those in large law firms—were high-priced, well-paid cogs in the law firm wheel. Their principal mission was to satisfy billing and realization goals in pursuit of the partnership gold ring. It was not for them to question the materiality of their work or to assess its value relative to cost or outcome. High salaries created a false positive measure of their client value. They were far removed from the client and worked on discrete slivers of matters.
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