Five Statements on the Future State of Innovation in Legal

1. FIVESTATEMENTS.O n T h e F u t u r e S t a t e o f I n n o v a t i o n i n L e g a l
Based on current conversations with leaders and
directors across the legal market. And, of course, our
unique perspectives based on working side-by-side with
CFOs, CIOs, practice group leaders, business teams, and
in-house leaders - operations & practitioners.
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2. 2020INNOVATION
STRATEGY
The global legal market – consumer and commercial is experiencing a once-in-a-
lifetime stress test. Dancing on the grave of status quo and proclaiming that now
everyone must and should innovate is a complete waste. The prudent (and
cunning) action is to double-down on addressing core foundational operational
challenges within your organization or legal team – whether you are a court system,
law school, law firm, in-house team, legal tech provider or legal aid.
C U R R E N T
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3. First, the
simple fact.
This crisis doesn’t magically imbue teams with the capability to generate innovation.
If your organization did not have the tools, skills, and resources pre-crisis, you certainly don’t
have them now. But that doesn’t mean you are stuck, just think about things differently.
© 2020 Bold Duck Studio

4. Second.
Convert your desire to be innovative into motivation to improve. Yes, mindsets may have
shifted in recent weeks to be more “open” to new approaches, but mindsets alone are
insufficient (see First Statement). Businesses right now are motivated to preserve themselves
in crisis. They are deeply concerned about reducing burn rates, retaining talent, de-stressing
systems and processes that have been bent and broken in the initial response, and finding
dollars to fill the pipeline – every dollar matters!
Motivation right now is to stabilize things and wring out costs. Seize this! Going after
uncertain “innovation” right now will produce incalculable strain, fatigue and stress. Solely
cutting costs is no path to profits either. Seeking to improve is stewardship and often creates
cost savings while improving business performance – in the short and long term.
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5. O U T C O M E
I N N O V A T I O N
Third.
It is not an activity, a title/role, or a committee. It’s just better not to focus on this word right
now and instead turn to tackle operational challenges (removing waste, calculating resource
scarcity and need, bettering connections between people and systems). This will lead to
improvements that matter right now and potentially true innovation, in the rare case.
© 2020 Bold Duck Studio

6. Fourth.
Legal in the broadest sense (from law and policy to services and technology)
has been slow to “discover” UX (user/human experience). This is about how
humans (citizens, consumers, employees, customers, lawyers) actually interact
within the legal ecosystem. Legal has an extremely poor track record on this
front which explains many of the disconnects that have been studied in legal
education, A2J, BigLaw culture, work/life balance of the profession, the middle-
class legal gap, and other segments and phenomenon.
Focusing on user experience nets out
positive gains in almost every case.
Many UX issues arise and are found within the operational environment of
teams. Also, a bad habit in legal is to focus on the front-end of innovation - “the
shiny object” - and not on integrating it into business practices and systems.
This lack of thoughtful integration breeds operational complexity and friction.
© 2020 Bold Duck Studio

7. Finally, design and entrepreneurship are what you must embrace. Whereas innovation all too often
is used as a catchall term for creating new ideas, service, and things – it fails to evoke a clear sense of
purpose and value. Design is about creating something that addresses a real problem with a real
solution – often in an entirely new way. Entrepreneurship is about bringing the “new” to market.
This means that someone will actually use it; ideally, seeking it out (and paying for it directly or
indirectly). Being an entrepreneur is also about being a founder and having a founder’s mindset.
When we think like designers and entrepreneurs instead of innovators, we are more prone to
consider the human and business realities of our ideas – not the idea itself. This helps ensure we use
evidence-based approaches to assess sustainability, cost, market-size, and whether anyone will
actually care about the idea (versus creating “cool” things in search of a problem or need).
Fifth.
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8. © 2020 Bold Duck Studio
INCLUDE BUSINESS
TEAMS AS WELL AS
PRACTICE TEAMS.
What irritants do people feel when they are
trying to get their job done?
people = you, your teammates, your peers, your customers and
clients, your leaders
Does the irritant interact with others? How?
How often?
interact = created by, made worse by, hidden by, softened by,
observed by, or occasionally prevented by
(THINK HONESTLY ABOUT YOUR ROLE IN ALL OF THIS . . .)
If this irritant was corrected, how would it
measurably improve business?
measurably = tangible movement of an accepted and respected
metric showing before and after
Don’t fake it. Be real. If you don’t have good
answers that others agree with, then STOP!

9. THE PROBLEM YOU WANT TO ADDRESS IS THE ONE THAT IS MOST
VALID, FEASIBILE, AND DESIRABLE. CHASING WEAK PROBLEMS IS A
FOOL’S ERRAND AND AN EGOMANIAC’S LUST.
© 2020 Bold Duck Studio
A VALID IDEA encompasses solutions and language that leadership and the organization
find cogent, coherent, and most of all, applicable and relevant to its current position and
ambitions. To be 100% clear; it must represent something that is worth chasing given all
other competing priorities.
A FEASIBLE IDEA consumes resources as efficiently and effectively as possible, given current availability/scarcity, while
achieving maximum value. It does this in a timeline that paces ahead of hostile efforts or ambivalent forces that will
impede progress. Also, feasibility addresses such intangibles as political resistance, change management, and resource
capability.
A DESIRABLE IDEA attracts curiosity and builds momentum for further development on the part of leadership and the
firm generally. If the idea’s value is too murky, difficult to communicate and convey, or appears incomplete, it will suffer
from erosion of support and emotional commitment.

10. New-2020
Now is the time to make our teams and organizations better by focusing
on what causes human frustration and making them easier to do
business with – as customers, clients, and employees. Improving these
will establish the foundation necessary for innovative outcomes.
The global legal market is being
presented with a grand
opportunity to usher in its
(next) age of entrepreneurship.
This is not about technology or killing status quo.
It is about going back to what drew
many of us to the profession – we
want to help people navigate the
legal system.
© 2020 Bold Duck Studio

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