Reinventing Professionals

I spoke with Matt Mahon, the National Manager for Information Governance and eDiscovery Sales at Ricoh. We discussed the workplace communications challenges that e-discovery and information governance practitioners are facing, whether professional communication has become more casual in this remote and work-from-home environment, and the challenges associated with interpreting emojis.

I spoke with Katherine Porter, an executive coach for female attorneys and the founder of the Transition Navigator. We discussed how design thinking can enhance a professional’s work, its relationship to the practice of law, the advantages of incorporating a designer’s mindset to client service in legal, ways to overcome the barriers to using design thinking to improve law firm operations, and how it can help law firms through this period of uncertainty.

I spoke with Adrian Camara, the CEO of Athennian, a developer of legal entity management software. We discussed who uses legal entity management software, what the focus on legal entity management indicates about the changing nature of legal services, and the challenges associated with raising capital in the current environment.

I spoke with Soumya Nettimi and Sarah Schaaf, the CEO and general manager of payments, respectively, for ASG LegalTech, a platform of legal SaaS products including PracticePanther, Bill4Time, MerusCase, and now following its recent acquisition, Headnote, of which Sarah is a co-founder and the former CEO. We discussed the alignment of Headnote with ASG LegalTech’s suite of products, how the future of payments in legal is evolving, and what the appetite for a suite of technology tools indicates about the shift in the business of law.

I spoke with Johannes Stiehler, the CEO of ayfie Group, an Oslo-based company that provides technology for collecting and processing data from different silos using linguistic technology. We discussed the company’s mission, how the appeal of linguistic technology at law firms and corporate legal departments has evolved, and ayfie’s listing on the Merkur Market in Oslo in July of 2020.

I spoke with Phil Anthony, Ph.D., division president at DecisionQuest, a U.S. Legal Support company. We discussed how the pandemic has changed trial consulting, ways to adapt in-person litigation to a virtual environment, how legal professionals are approaching virtual depositions and trials, and reactions from jurors to COVID-19.

I spoke with Evan Shenkman, the senior director of knowledge management at Fisher Phillips, a labor and employment law firm. We discussed how knowledge management has changed over the past few months, the firm’s recent alliance with LegalMation and Thomson Reuters, how it will benefit clients and practitioners, and what the heightened focus on automation means for the future of the practice of law.

I spoke with Jared Correia, the founder and CEO at Red Cave Law Firm Consulting, and the co-founder of Gideon Software, a website chatbot and automatic scheduling tool built exclusively for law firms. We discussed the challenges that Gideon helps law firms address, ways that the pandemic impacts how lawyers approach and use technology, and advice for launching a consulting practice and a legal tech startup.

I spoke with Amy Osteen, the founder of Outside CLO, a service for corporations that need an outsourced chief legal officer. We discussed why a company would outsource its in-house counsel needs, how that work differs from outside counsel at a law firm, and how the pandemic has impacted the appeal of outsourced in-house counsel services.

I spoke with Carolyn Elefant, an attorney, who focuses her practice on energy and environmental matters. She is also the author of several books, including the popular, Solo by Choice: How to Be the Lawyer You Always Wanted to Be, and has been blogging at MyShingle for almost 18 years. She is producing a virtual conference called the Lawyer Mom Owner Summit for lawyers who are moms that own or want to start a law firm. We discussed the Summit, what its attendees can expect, and how the practice of law has changed.