The legal profession has changed dramatically in so many ways since I started my career. But I see a future where that pace of change is going to increase even faster than before, and firms and partners need to be ready.
Let me highlight four key areas.
You must be specialised
I believe you will see a further increase in the specialisation that we have seen over the last two decades. The practitioner who was good at a lot of different things was more the norm 30 years ago. And, while that had many advantages, we have slowly but surely been moving in the direction of specialisation, which reflects the sheer scope and depth of information and knowledge that needs to be evaluated and clarified.
To give clients bespoke expert advice, you must have that degree of specialisation wherever you are based in the world. And AI’s widespread adoption will only increase the need to focus on appropriate insightful strategic advice, rather than regurgitating broad legal concepts . The phrase ‘jack of all trades and master of none’ has never been more relevant.
You must be financially disciplined
We are already seeing a growing trend of law firms becoming far more rigorous in terms of their financial planning and execution. A decade ago, the CFO at a law firm was fairly anonymous. Today, they are part of every strategic discussion at board level. We are facing unprecedented financial demands on our profit and loss account from AI and technology investments, pressures to expand with new teams and more substantive wage bills. Historically, we were a capital-light industry but now we have to be capital heavy.
And we have to be ready to embrace new ways of monetising our work and our advice. While there is still a place for the billable hour, I think more financial arrangements will be based on project fees.
A few years ago, the idea of private equity (PE) investors taking a stake in, or owning a law firm, would have been an abomination to partnerships which valued control and collegiality above everything else. As a firm, Kennedys is not considering PE investment at the moment. We believe we can have the best of both worlds by achieving real financial rigour and a culture of expertise in our business services teams, while maintaining partnership independence. We still need to understand the drivers of why some of our competitors have taken the PE plunge though.
You must be global in reach
What is increasingly important for both full-service firms operating across multiple sectors and more specialised firms like Kennedys, is global reach. For a firm like ours, which is focused on the insurance sector and is truly international in its scope, our clients want to capitalise on the experience and knowledge we have not just from our depth of expertise in the UK, but also our industry-leading lawyers in the US, APAC, EMEA or LATAM.
Clients are going to want and need global expertise on the ground and that’s going to be critical for any successful firm. In an environment of so much noise and distraction, you want trusted advisers who really know their market. The days of fly-in and fly-out legal services are numbered, at least for the work that we do. And for those same reasons, that need for global reach is one of the main drivers for the current wave of mergers and acquisitions in the market.
AI-transformed
I recently told some of our young associates and business service professionals how envious I was of their future.
There has been a lot of discussion about how AI will transform our profession. People shouldn’t be scared of it. They should be embracing the change, not running away from it. Curiosity about AI tools, financial models, or essential future skills should motivate us all.
Firms will have to look hard at their training and mentoring. Young lawyers used to have years to discover analytical and judgement skills by doing the more mundane tasks that will now disappear with AI. This is, or will be, a new world where that luxury of time to develop those skills by osmosis and to bill for the work done, will soon be dramatically different.
Yes, there will be a change in how you use attorneys within a firm but that does not mean a dramatic change in the numbers in the workforce overall. AI will allow us to do more for clients enhancing our offering, rather than headcount retrenchments across the board.
It’s going to be exciting, and people should be thrilled that they’re entering the workforce right now.
But the pace of the change will be rapid. Who knows what challenges we will be facing in five years’ time. What I do know, is that for the people with the right attitude the sky is the limit . If I were ten years younger, I would seize every opportunity to be at the forefront of these transformations, learning, growing, and embracing all the innovation that’s set to redefine our profession.
