Updated to add Ralph Baxter’s perspective. If you see many of your friends walking around like zombies, don’t assume they are infected by Zika, Labor Day parties or East Coast paranoia about Ms. Hermine. They may be recovering from ILTACON 16—held this year at the Gaylord National Resort & Convention Center, near Washington, D.C. The event kicked off Sunday, Aug. 28 and wrapped up Thursday, Sept. Presented by the International Legal Technology Association, the conference is an intense, exhilarating, exhausting, inspiring, educating and entertaining marathon, so give your colleagues some space so they can return to so-called normality.

 

Traditionally, ILTA has keynotes on Monday and Tuesday, and they often bring in professional speakers. I’m not a fan of most professional presenters, because they typically don’t tailor the speech to the audience—they just mention the organization’s name a couple times. (An excellent exception: Apollo 13 Astronaut James “Jim” Lovell, who taught us to always, always carry duck tape [always!]  in his amazing and inspiring 2007 keynote, “A Successful Failure.”)

But Tuesday’s keynote was a grand slam. The presentation covered a spot-on topic of tremendous relevance to the audience; the speaker was dynamic and engaging, with effective visuals; and he actually stayed at the conference and participated in two panels.

Daniel Martin Katz, Professor of Law at IIT Chicago-Kent College of Law (and affiliated faculty at CodeX) delivered the best—and most relevant—keynote I have ever heard at ILTA in more than 20 years. Called “Measure Twice, Cut Once: Solving the Legal Profession’s Biggest Problems Together,” Katz offered a road map to salvage the legal profession and give clients what the need and demand.

Yes, that sounds dramatic—because it is.

Katz argues that we must rethink the economics of law—and create financially rigorous measures of the value of legal services. The legal profession must build a more perfect supply chain, and move many decisions from “art” to the “science” column, he said.

Katz addressed the social, economic and political conplexities—and what must change. He explained that the Richard Susskind analysis of “bespoke” versus “commodity” billing has evolved. Today’s commodity work can be closer to bespoke, he said, citing pizza as an example. Katz used the analogy that Sal Consiglio (Sally’s APizza) may deliver truly bespoke pizza and Dominos figured out a way to create “industrial” pie—but the emerging trend is the “artisan industrial pie (as evidenced by Blaze Pizza, etc.).

The key to Katz’s message is the need to “Capture, Clean, Regularize Data” to support a range of tasks and develop data roadmaps. “We want data to help support two major things: substantive predictions; procedural predictions,” he said. “Rich/granular data can help illuminate the actual processes present in various (legal) organizations.”

“Transparency as the relationship glue (and trust that comes with transparency),” said Katz.

Katz addressed the use of “substantive legal predictions” in the arena of e-discovery and also discussed  the role of crowds. He mentioned, as an example, how AIG developed its “Driven Legal Ops Business.”

“Dan’s presentation was a genuine ‘keynote'”, said Ralph Baxter, Fellow and Senior Advisor to CodeX. “He articulated a grand vision for what is possible if those who deliver legal service embrace technology and process design. While he focused principally on quantitative and financial issues, his message was bigger than that: he invited the audience to open their minds and engage their imaginations. There is a better world ahead and the ILTA attendees hold the keys to taking us there,” said Baxter, who is also chairman of the Thomson Reuters Legal Executive Institute and Senior Advisor and served as Chairman and CEO at Orrick, Herrington & Sutcliffe for 23 years.

Katz also participated in two ILTACON panels: “Artificial Intelligence—The Impact of AI and Real Business Applications in Legal,” and “Client and Law Firm Workshop: Technology, Data, Metrics, Strategy.”

Slides: http://bit.ly/2c9S927

 

Interested in more? Check out his upcoming FinLegalTechConference.com conference in Chicago, Nov. 4.

 

 

Monica Bay is a Fellow at CodeX and a member of the California bar. She is a freelance journalist and analyst. Email: mbay@codex.stanford.edu.  Twitter: @MonicaBay

Cover image: Clipart.com