Introduction
Reading legal tech blogs or attending legal tech conferences and meetings, one might get the impression that it is actually too late for us corporate lawyers to adapt. Supposedly, we are too slow and too arrogant to change, and we are already
K.
Jacob (*)SAP SE, Walldorf, Germany e-mail: kai.jacob@sap.com
© Springer International Publishing AG 2017
K. Jacob et al. (eds.), Liquid Legal, Management for Professionals,
DOI 10.1007/978-3-319-45868-7_20 surrounded by legal robots1 and hackers[171] [172] who are faster and smarter than us and will do our jobs in the future. And maybe there's some truth to that—maybe the time for the pampered average lawyer doing average lawyer stuff is coming to an end. But for some of us, for us legal entrepreneurs and innovators who keep an open mind, who listen and learn, I believe the journey has only just started! We are excited because we understand that we have the historical chance to participate in something extraordinary: the transformation of a whole industry. The enormous speed with which the legal tech market matures and delivers technical solutions that threaten the status quo must be an inspiration and a call to action for us! Legal startup companies have new ideas, they experiment, build solutions fast, and when they fail (as happens to most start-ups across all industries)—the next and even smarter generation of entrepreneurs comes along and continues the work, based on lessons learned—and so the innovation cycle continues...
One could become dizzy following the development of this rather young Legal Tech industry that started in the 80s with legal expert systems, followed by legal ontologies, but that since then emerged into areas which sound unfamiliar, not to say awkward for most lawyers still: machine learning, artificial intelligence, neural learning, NLP etc.
My advice is to forget all the buzzwords and concentrate on the here and now.
If we understand the basic principles on what our future will be built on, we will learn, grow and adapt as we go. We lawyers do not have to become programmers, but developing a basic skillset on how applications are built is crucial to shape and benefit from the transformation of legal departments.In my article I will argue that Legal Information Management (LIM) is the key differentiator in a progressing competitive environment, and that legal departments/ law firms who are “information enabled” will have a strategic advantage over those who hesitantly wait. I will describe what I call a “LIM strategy”: the aim to easily get access in real-time to all relevant information that is required to perform the legal department's work in the most effective and efficient way. Using SAP as example, I will elaborate what it is, what we have achieved, where we want to go next, and how we can get there.
I predict that antiquated department structures will dissolve, and that legal will transform into an amalgam of skills overcoming the weaknesses created by today's functional silos. This transformation requires a fundamental shift in mind-sets and can only be achieved if motivated people, who understand their business process and are open to new information technology, collaborate and openly exchange ideas. Tomorrow's lawyer will be part of a “liquid legal” team—able to adapt quickly and easily to changing business needs.
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