Conclusion
Teams who dedicate their whole attention only on fixing the urgent topics will most certainly achieve one thing: a joint burn-out. Whereas clever teams of our age will free up time to work on the important topics.
Information is everywhere and our focus should be to transform passive data into active information and such information into insights to better steer our profession in a digital (if not golden) future. The indispensable foundation for such a transformation is leadership, both on a personal as well as on an executive level. Identifying the right people or teams and providing them with title, mandate and budget is the crucial first step—the rest will follow.Liquid Legal Context
By Dr. Dierk Schindler, Dr. Roger Strathausen, Kai Jacob
Jacob argues that defining your legal departments unified legal information strategy is not only necessary, but the perfect starting point for the digital transformation. Such a strategy provides deep insights in what your team is doing, and why it matters. Decomposing legal work (as described by Richard Susskind) and identifying the person (or automated process) best equipped to deliver each activity is what in-house legal departments should focus on. And you can only do this with reliable facts & numbers!
“Information-enable legal”—what does that mean? Why are some teams seemingly 10 times faster, better and cheaper than others?
Jacob warns not solely to add tools to an already overly complex and heterogeneous system landscape. Where there is no market leader, MAKE, where there is one, BUY. Two other aspects should also be closely monitored as part of your Legal Information strategy: first, the integration of all tools in order to support a central dashboard as proposed by Timmer. But secondly, and no less important, let's continue to think about how companies will effectively interact in future.
Will there be something like a “Central Legal Platform”, setting the standard in services, collaboration, the use of templates and other legal technology?Let's have another look into Legal Tech industry, based on the overview provided by Zetterberg/Wojcik.
References
Christensen, C. M. (1997). The innovator’s dilemma: When new technologies cause great firms to fail. Boston: Harvard Business School Press.
Friedman, T. L. (2005). The world is flat: A brief history of the twenty-first century. New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux.
Ismail, S., Malone, M. S., & van Geest, Y. (2014). Exponential organizations: Why new organizations are ten times better, faster, and cheaper than yours (and what to do about it). New York: Diversion Books.
Kai Jacob Head of Global Contract & Legal Information Management, IACCM VP of EMEA
Kai a lawyer by education, joined SAP in 2008 and heads the Global Contract Management Services team since 2011. In 2015, he assumed additional responsibility for Legal Information Management, aiming to support the digital transformation of the legal function. Kai joined IACCM (International Association of Contract and Commercial Management) in 2004, became a member of its Board of Directors in 2012, and since January 2014 has been serving as Officer & Vice Chair EMEA. Kai is a regular speaker at conferences and engaged in various round-tables, boards and initiatives in support of his vision of LIQUID LEGAL.