Reinventing Professionals

I spoke with Krishna Srinivasan, a founding general partner at LiveOak Venture Partners in Austin, Texas, an early stage venture capital firm, with investments in a variety of companies, including e-discovery review software provider, DISCO. We discussed the genesis of LiveOak Venture Partners. how the firm makes investment decisions, why legal technology is currently attracting so much attention, the advantages and disadvantages of investing in legal, and investment trends in this sector for 2017.

I spoke with a panel of industry leaders in a virtual roundtable about where the legal field is headed and asked for their advice on navigating prospective 2017 challenges. The participants include: Laura Broomell, COO of Greene Espel, and president of the Association of Legal Administrators; Ray English, Assistant Dean for the Office of Career and Employment Services at Sandra Day O’Connor College of Law at Arizona State University; Jordan Furlong, principal, Law21; Tony Gomes, SVP and General Counsel, Citrix Systems; Bill Henderson, Professor of Law, Indiana University Maurer School of Law; Kate Holmes, managing director, FTI Technology; and, Joshua Rothman, partner, Fitzpatrick, Cella, Harper & Scinto. From cybersecurity and global policy uncertainty to changes in the selection of outside counsel and career services aligning with admissions, descriptions of a destabilizing market were tempered with a recognition of the opportunities ahead.

I spoke with a panel of industry leaders in a virtual roundtable about where the legal field is headed and asked for their advice on navigating prospective 2017 challenges. The participants include: Laura Broomell, COO of Greene Espel, and president of the Association of Legal Administrators; Ray English, Assistant Dean for the Office of Career and Employment Services at Sandra Day O’Connor College of Law at Arizona State University; Jordan Furlong, principal, Law21; Tony Gomes, SVP and General Counsel, Citrix Systems; Bill Henderson, Professor of Law, Indiana University Maurer School of Law; Kate Holmes, managing director, FTI Technology; and, Joshua Rothman, partner, Fitzpatrick, Cella, Harper & Scinto. From cybersecurity and global policy uncertainty to changes in the selection of outside counsel and career services aligning with admissions, descriptions of a destabilizing market were tempered with a recognition of the opportunities ahead.

I spoke with David Ahrens, the chief marketing officer of FRONTEO USA, Inc., a publicly-traded global technology and services company that specializes in big data, artificial intelligence, information governance, managed review and litigation consulting for the e-discovery market. We discussed the company’s acquisition of managed review provider Essential Discovery, Inc., how the addition of EDI supports the company’s continued reinvention, why M&A so active in the legal technology community, and where the industry is headed in 2017.

I spoke with Mike Murray, the director of client solutions, at Veritext, a national provider of court reporting and deposition services. He is also responsible for Law Studio, the company’s collaborative workspace. I spoke with Mike Murray, the director of client solutions, at Veritext, a national provider of court reporting and deposition services. He is also responsible for Law Studio, the company’s collaborative workspace. We discussed the evolution of Law Studio since its launch at Legaltech New York earlier this year, how it is helping lawyers send and receive data securely, factors that differentiate it from other collaborative workspace platforms, and ways that the cloud is impacting the manner in which professionals share information, among other topics.

I spoke with Brad Blickstein, the founder of the Blickstein Group, a consulting firm that helps businesses serve corporate law departments and their law firms. He was the co-founder of Corporate Legal Times (now known as Inside Counsel) and is currently the publisher of the Annual Law Department Operations Survey. We discussed the genesis of the Blickstein Group and the Law Department Operations Survey (produced in partnership with Consilio, QuisLex, Exterro. Onit, Legal Decoder, and Wolters Kluwer ELM Solutions), the issues the survey addresses, how the role of legal operations professionals has changed, and the surprising results of his research, among other topics.