BarTalk October 2001
Volume 13, Number 5

Evolving to meet the future

by David J Bilinsky

picture you gettin’ down in a picture tube
like you lit the fuse
you think it’s fictional
mystical? maybe spiritual……
my future is coming on
it’s coming on
it’s coming on
it’s coming on…
Words and music by 2D/Murdoc/Del Tha Funky Homosapien
Recorded by Gorillaz

You have a meeting with your office administrator to discuss the firm’s quarterly billing and collection report. As you review the numbers it becomes apparent that your younger partners are establishing a disturbing trend – not only are they attracting young and vibrant clients but they are billing and collecting more than some, indeed most, of the seasoned partners. There is a new dynamic at work – the firm’s newest clients are attracted to the younger lawyers who understand these clients’ interactive, fast-paced, internet-driven business models and who also understand the underlying technology used to facilitate and implement these new businesses. As busy as these younger partners are, you foresee the day when there will be a palace revolt unless the more established partners can learn and adapt to the new environment. Problem is, how do you start?

Adaptation to change is easy when the rate of change is gradual. However, when the rate of change accelerates and incorporates factors into the environment that were once seen as external, such as new technology, then reliance on gradual adaptation can be fatal – just ask the dinosaurs. How do you continue to remain relevant and accelerate your adaptation to change? Let us examine some of the suggestions put forward in this regard:

Learning to Forget
All of us have a frame of reference that we use to understand and interpret the world. We have a problem when that frame of reference turns into an albatross and blinds us into believing that what we don’t know isn’t worth knowing. Technology can all too easily be seen as playing a support role rather than being central to the way business is and will be conducted from here on in. Part of adapting to a new environment is learning to forget past frames of reference and learning to see the boundaries to our own knowledge.

Creating Curiosity
A recent study by Thomas G. Reio Jr., and Albert Wiswell (Human Resource Development Quarterly, Vol.11, No.1, Spring 2000), of the effects of curiosity on performance shows that curiosity improves technical and interpersonal performance on the job. How? Curiosity leads to greater learning. This study showed the need to have people approach learning, relationships, and work with questions. Create an environment where people are curious about new developments and motivated to find new solutions.

Visible Vulnerability
Let’s face it – as lawyers we are paranoid about showing the least glimpse that we do not have a complete grasp of everything around us. To learn we must open ourselves up to the learning experience – which means trying new things and inevitably making mistakes. If necessary, set up a learning environment outside of the office and away from peers.

Public Attention
When the firm leaders are not particularly interested in change or interested in growth, then there are no organizational developmental goals or infrastructure technological goals. Set measurable goals on the introduction, adaptation and use of technology and make it known that financial success depends, in part, on the successful grasp of new technologies.

Aging Vision
Who answers the question in the firm “What’s New?” How many firms have a vision that was generated at some time in the past and continues to rule the organization? Have you made it explicitly clear that the firm must continue to update its internal concept of itself to remain relevant? Have you asked the question of what kind of legal services should we be providing in 5-15 years? What new knowledge must we acquire to be able to provide those services? What requirements are there on existing partners to master this knowledge?

Product Obsolescence
How many areas of practice did not exist 10-15 years ago? Innovation occurs constantly but we can lose sight of this when we are busy fighting it out in the trenches.

Family lawyers – litigators – have seen colleagues formally state they are not going to take cases to court. Commercial lawyers have had to deal with intricacies of software licensing agreements. Intellectual Property lawyers have to deal with concepts of how doing business via a certain web page design can be protected. Personal Injury lawyers have to deal with injuries caused by new environmental contaminants. Imagine that your existing services will be obsolete in five years. Now imagine the knowledge that you must gain to remain relevant.

Invest in Diverse Points of View
How often do the partners listen to people in the organization who are unconventional, who may not be as experienced as the partners and who raise questions for which there may be no answers? For example, how many litigators have considered virtual reality and its role in trials? This was a very big topic at a recent symposium on trial techniques and holds promise as a powerful new tool for advocates.

Bring in speakers to the firm who may be 20-something and who know a thing or two about emerging technologies. Set up committees with an internal monitoring function whose purpose is to keep the partners informed of emerging technologies and their potential impact on law practice and the firm in particular. Have debates between the differing points of view to bring out and sharpen the focus on the future. Have someone whose job is to experiment with new tools and explore their potential for the firm.

Demonstrate Leadership
Delegate what can be delegated – but don’t delegate the yoke of leadership. Be the first to embrace new technologies that are being adopted by the firm. Call for others to do the same. Go to seminars and encourage others to innovate. The strategic role of a managing partner is to demonstrate a sense of mission – of purpose, of meaningful difference for the clients and rewarding work for those in the firm. The leader should jump into the maelstrom of learning new technologies and be seen getting their hands dirty grappling with change to send the right message to the rest of the troops.

Whatever the area of law that you practice, tomorrow is coming to you at the speed of light from the end of a computer monitor. Hopefully it has lit a fuse within you that is generating a picture of what the future can hold for you…and in the process helping you undergo a transformation, whether that be mystical or spiritual…either way it is coming on.

David J Bilinsky is the Practice Management Advisor at the Law Society of British Columbia. He can be reached on the Internet at dbilinsky@lsbc.org. The views expressed herein are strictly those of the author and may not be shared by the Law Society of British Columbia.

This article originally appeared in the October 2001 issue of BarTalk and is reproduced here with permission of both the author and the Canadian Bar Association, British Columbia Branch.