I met a lawyer named Alice the other day, who does a lot of unsophisticated work, as well as a bit of higher-end work. Through her looking glass, Alice does not spy Wonderland. Instead, she fears that much of the work that she is doing will become a commodity, and her competitors will flock to low-cost service providers who use technology to produce legal documents.
Stephen Shapiro is a speaker and advisor on business transformation. He wrote an article titled, “The Art of Decision Making” after the publisher rejected his preferred title of, “When You Sit on the Fence, You Get Splinters in Your Ass!” In his article, he argues that “movement in any direction is better than stagnation or indecision,” and he concludes that “if you sit on the fence, all you will get are splinters.”
This Article is about what lawyers need from LegalTech providers. I use Wills and Estates as an example, but the principles apply to many areas of practice.
You can read the article here: https://appara.ai/news-and-insights/where-theres-a-will
Do any of you old-timers remember the first ten minutes of Raiders of the Lost Ark? Let me refresh your memory.
Dr. Jones retrieves the golden idol and tries to escape the cave. A giant boulder rolls towards him as he frantically tries to get out of its way. Finally he jumps over a cliff, only to come face to face with some scary looking natives with bows and arrows. Things only got worse for him from there.
My legal career drove me crazy. Granted, it was not a very long drive, but I suspect that with a bit of knowledge and a great deal of counselling, perhaps I could have taken an off-ramp before I got there.
In a better world, people contemplating a career in law would be told that: (i) it is stressful; and (ii) they should take steps to become their best psychological self before they start down that road.