Law21

My newest post at Law21 asks: What could we remove from the legal education and lawyer licensing process to make it faster and less expensive, yet also more effective? Customized online law degrees, contemporaneous learning and doing, supervised practice internships -- here's a radically different vision of lawyer formation. https://www.law21.ca//frugal-innovation-in-lawyer-formati/

My newest blog post at Slaw takes a well-deserved swipe at Milton Friedman and proposes a radically different view of the purpose of law firms. http://www.slaw.ca/2021/02/11/the-stakeholder-law-firm/

Reflecting the new focus of my writing and consulting work, my newest post at Law21 contends that our current understanding of "lawyer competence" is inadequate -- that we need to consider not just a lawyer's knowledge and skills, but also their workplace environment and personal circumstances. To be a competent lawyer should mean not only that you possess the tools of proficient practice, but also that you can actually apply them in the real world. https://www.law21.ca//lawyer-competence-in-three-dimensio/

Two new Law21 posts from me today, containing some significant news: 1. Announcing the release of my 80-page report for the Law Society of Alberta, recommending numerous changes to the lawyer licensing and competence assurance systems in that province. https://www.law21.ca//lawyer-licensing-and-competence-in-/ 2. Announcing a shift in my writing and consulting work, away from law firms and towards improving lawyer formation, legal education, professional development, and le...gal services regulation. https://www.law21.ca/2020/12/heading-in-a-new-direction/ Thank you sincerely for all your interest in my work during this challenging year for all of us, and I look forward to continuing to share my thoughts and analyses with you in 2021.

My newest blog post at Law21 explains why the everyday physical proximity of your lawyers can't be assumed anymore -- and therefore, why law firms can't leave their culture, leadership, and associate development to the whims of fate any longer. https://www.law21.ca/2020/12/the-end-of-serendipity/

Six months to the day since I wrote my last Law21 post, here's my newest one, looking back at the effects of the pandemic and ahead to what the future will bring -- and what we'll bring to the future. https://lnkd.in/d2NYeiP

The 10th and last entry in my "Pandemic" series of posts is up at Law21. It serves as a commencement speech for a generation of lawyers graduating into a global crisis and gives them their first assignment: to help lead the rebuild of a broken profession.

The latest instalment in my Pandemic series at Law21 is now live, featuring: * a detailed thought experiment about the eventual future of law firms, * links to more than two dozen articles about law firm strategy and management, and * an announcement that my book about law firms, "Law Is A Buyer's Market," is now free for you to download.

The latest post in my Pandemic series at Law21 offers eight suggestions for transitioning your law business through the short- and medium-term of the coronavirus crisis, with some encouraging words at the end for the stressed-out and crisis-ridden among us.

My Law21 series on the pandemic's impact on law finally turns to law firms -- smaller and sole practices in particular. Here's the money quote from the conclusion: "In a crisis, you learn very quickly what really matters. To my mind, what matters to your law business are: - you, the lawyer;... - the people who depend on you; - the clients on whom you depend; an - the cash that keeps your business breathing. So focus on the essentials. And at the end of each day, be at peace that you’ve done what you could as a lawyer, and be with your family and support network. We’re all in this together. And together is how we’ll all get out of it." https://www.law21.ca/20//pandemic-vii-law-firm-essentials/

The next two posts in my Law21 series on law and the pandemic are up. If you're interested in law school, legal education, bar admission, lawyer licensing, and new lawyer hiring -- collectively, lawyer formation -- these are for you: - How to rescue lawyer formation during the crisis (https://www.law21.ca//04/pandemic-v-lawyer-formation-resc/) - How to re-engineer lawyer formation for the longer term (https://www.law21.ca//pandemic-vi-lawyer-formation-re-eng/)

"The lawyer formation process is breaking down in front of us. It’s breaking down because it’s a disjointed, cobbled-together collection of self-interested fiefdoms that have been allowed to call their own shots and pursue their own goals for decades." The fourth entry in my Law21 series about the impact of the pandemic on the legal sector looks at how the lawyer formation process has been irreversibly disrupted by the crisis, and why. https://www.law21.ca//pandemic-iv-lawyer-formation-disrup/

The next two posts in my series about the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on the legal sector are now up at Law21: - "Richard Susskind has made many insightful observations over the course of his career, but I suspect one will outlast all the others: 'We have to decide if court is a place or a service.' For hundreds of years right up until last month, in fact court has been a place. By the time this pandemic has truly run its course, court will be a service." https://www....law21.ca/2020//pandemic-ii-justice-system-down/ - "This pandemic is going to do more than just close down courtrooms it’s going to radically reduce the ability of the entire legal system to respond to needs and inquiries. We need to scale up our legal information and solutions provision and we can only do that properly if we conceive and build from the start a system that is intended to scale and is designed for one-to-many solutions." https://www.law21.ca///pandemic-iii-justice-reconstructed/