Helder Santos

[00:00:00] Helder, thanks for joining me today. Ni- nice to, to be here, Ted. Thank you for inviting me. Absolutely. Absolutely. Yeah, you and I had a, a real good conversation and, um, I think you had-- We, we posted on a similar topic recently, and I really enjoyed what you had wrote about, so I knew I had to have you on the show.

Thank you. Thank you. And, uh, uh, reading your LinkedIn posts is also a, a very good exercise, and it's always a, an, a nice, uh- inspiration for what we are seeing in the, in the writing and understanding what's happening in this crazy legal tech world. So- Yeah, I, I appreciate that. I, I enjoy it, and it, it seems to have good engagement, so it's a win-win.

Well, um, why don't we just do i- you do a quick introduction, who you are- Yeah ... what you do and where you do it, and then we'll, uh, we'll jump into our agenda. Sure, sure. [00:01:00] Um, I'm, I'm Helder Santos. I'm the global head of legal tech and innovation at Bird & Bird, a top 20 UK firm. Um, global, um, I'm based in Frankfurt.

I'm born and raised in Portugal. Um, before that I spent some years at a Big Four. Before that I spent a long, a long season at other law firm. Um, I lead the team of technologists, uh, lawyers, um, technical people, uh, mainly on the service delivery, but also in the internal efficiency, um, and everything that is mainly touching AI.

Uh, ends in my desk or my, my team's desk and, uh, interesting journey, to be fair. Yeah. It, it, it definitely is. I mean, it's interesting to us as a, as a vendor in the space. You know, I've been, I've been serving law firms for, for 20 years now, and, [00:02:00] um, I've never seen anything like it. S- some good, some I scratch my head at.

You know, we were at ILTACON a couple weeks ago, and the size of the exhibits was, um, so unbelievable. I'm thinking, man, there is, it- ... capital markets have really changed. Like, back in the day, the Silicon Valley was not the least bit interested in legal tech, right? Yeah. And, and that has changed so dramatically that I get probably three to four emails a week, sometimes more, from venture funds inquiring about making an investment.

And we're not even, like we-- There is an AI story around what we do, but we're not a practice facing AI solution. Yes. And we still get that sort of like inbound activity. I don't know, what is your take on all of the craziness? Do you think all this is, is good or, or creating risk? Well, it, it, it's a, [00:03:00] it, it depends on the angle that you come.

I think, I think what we need to, to understand is the legal market was very stable, as we know, in the last 30, 40, 50 years. Um, I think this moment is Everyone sees AI as the catalyst. It's something that touched w- on the foundations of being a lawyer and how law firms operate and so on. But I think the, the true story is the transformation.

Um, and I think it's not... H- you, you refer to ILTACON, I had the same experience in Legal Tech Talk in, uh, in, in London. It become a show rather than something that you really can bring value. It's vendors and, and who has the big- uh, the biggest, uh, exhibition and who has the, uh, the biggest, uh, Hollywood artist, uh, um, actor and so on.

And I, I th- [00:04:00] I think this is, is the wrong side of the coin. I think what we need to look is really what that means for the legal market, and I think we need to focus on the legal expertise rather, uh, more than the, if the lawyers have AI, if you have, uh, vendor one or vendor two. I think is we need to, like I said, the transformation is what matters here, and I think this transformation will be valid on how law or how legal expertise becomes transparent, accessible, and scalable.

Because people tend to see the big headlines, but we still have problems in access to justice. We still have problems in, in, uh, uh, different countries. Everyone looks at UK, uh, US, but there is an entire world out there. Um, and I think that is what we really need to [00:05:00] look, the, the transparency, uh, the accessibility, and how we scale.

And just to pick up on, on, on before, this is the real transformation. It's not if you have a 15 billion company or if you are drafting faster or whatever. I think this is what it really matters. Um, and, and again, there is some concerns of course, but I think it's more the concerns on big law is be- being challenged as they've never been.

Um, and I think that is my takeaway right now. Yeah. You know, you mentioned transparency, so I'm gonna go off script for just a minute because I just recorded a podcast with a leader of a, um, organization of inside legal teams, and we were talking about transparency. And you know what we do. We've, we've shown you our platform before, but it's, it's a legal extranet solution.

[00:06:00] Mm-hmm. And, um, we have integrations with all of the back office systems that a law firm has, and they can build very, um, data rich presentation layers for their clients. And, um, many of them choose not to because there is a hesitation within the law firm culture To be transparent, in fact, we were... One of our customers who already owns the product, we- I had breakfast with him and we were talking about, uh, this and he was like, "Ted," he goes, "We used to have year-to-date billing at the bottom of our invoice, and some partner came into my office and said we need to remove that."

I'm like, you know, "Okay, uh, they know what the number is. Like, they have the number too." But I don't know, is there, like, with respect to transparency, is, is law firm culture aligned with... Like, are they ready for that? Because I agree there's an, there's a [00:07:00] demand for it, but I'm curious your take on that. I, I, I think this transparency will come when law firms change a bit.

The, the mindset is I think law firms need to understand what the clients value as today. And I think if we... Everyone talks about judgment. Of course, clients will value the judgment, but they will also value the trust because they're still a bit trust vendor, you trust in the ven- in the vendor. There is commercial context, of course, that you refer, but I think clients will value the outcomes and I, I think that is where the transparency will come.

Clients will not prioritize the access to information or the billable hour or whatever. They will value the outcomes, and I think this will force the business model to be much more transparent. And I think then you [00:08:00] will see On the s- the other side, more quality and the better client experience. How many of us in the last 20 years are always saying, "Oh, the client wants this."

But to be fair, how many lawyers ask the client what they really want? Uh, because they assume, "Oh, we need a extranet or we need a, um, a fancy dashboard," but they never accept it. S- of course, law firms do these client surveys and, and the net score and so on, but I think there is still a, a path to, to go in that direction.

And, and then you, you enter on the, on the other side, that is how the work is organized. Because clients until now, they receive an output, but they never understood how much that is people, how much that is processes, how much that is technology. And I think all of that needs [00:09:00] to be shown to the client how it's organized, and then transparency comes there.

What is the problem of saying to a client, "Yes, we use tech. You allow us to use tech," uh, gen AI in this case, "and this is the outcome and this is the benefit, and this is how we price it, and this is the outcome that you are paying." I, I think that is the transparency part that, that, um, that needs to be done.

Agreed. Well, it-- the last time we spoke, you, you said something that caught my ear. You said that, uh, innovation was the enabler, not the objective of the transformation. W- what did you mean by that? Uh, pick up on this, on this thing that I was saying about outcomes. Clients want better outcomes, right? And I think no one wakes up in the morning a- and said, "I want innovation."

No, no one says that. They, they just want a better outcomes. That means the innovation, at least how, how I perceive and I, I, I do my [00:10:00] work, is it's just an enabler to a- a end goal and that end goal should be the client satisfaction and that is again the outcome. And I think is, is developer position. That's why I'm always saying that is an enabler because everyone is saying, "Oh, innovation is what we need to do."

No, innovation is just how we do it every day. Even... I, I give you a s- simple, even when you walk home, sometimes you change your way home, you are innovating on that just because you need a different outcome, you need to see different people or, or whatever. And I, I think it's just that, um, and that is how I, I praise how we should do innovation.

Makes sense. Um, what about the, uh, what about the idea that historically has seemed to have a lot of consensus that legal expertise being untouchable? It feels like we're, we're, we're [00:11:00] entering into a new era and that's no longer the case. But I guess what, what will remain out of reach as we transform and, and leverage tech?

Is, is it all up for grabs or, um, do you think there's a certain subset of expertise that will remain untouchable? Um, two years ago in a conference in Italy, I had a presentation that was the future partner of the law firm, something like that. And I basically what I said that is the lawyers will be stop be s- they will not be longer the, the guardians or the hold of the knowledge.

They will be the architect of innovation. And when I'm saying that is they will become the, the, the ones that will build the solution for the client, for the legal industry rather [00:12:00] than I know th- this is my expertise. The expertise I think is like, like we, we said, it's no- no longer untouchable. I think developer position and also the AI challenges is changing that and I think the lawyers needs to become the architect- architects of innovation and that is even starting from which type of people they have around them, how the law firm will deliver different service.

Um, a law firm of the future is no longer just lawyers and we know that. Uh, it will be a complete different mindset o- of people and I think that is what, how I see it. Lawyers needs to move to holding the knowledge to how I use my knowledge and my mindset and everything that I know to architect the, the outcome.

Um, and I think that is what I'm, I'm, I'm, I'm preaching a bit [00:13:00] internally is we need to really to change the business model because it's just a new world. Yeah. Um, you know, as far as lawyers being the innovators, that's not historically been, um, the case. Uh, certainly lawyers innovate in how they practice law, right?

Like Marty Lipton with the poison pill, that was a- Mm-hmm ... that was a big innovation in the 1980s, right? Um, so it's not that I, I don't think they're, they're capable of it, but i- in terms of the business model, it hasn't changed in 50 years. Almost nothing has changed. Yeah. I mean, we've had some email, you know, electronic email, electronic research, uh, still billable hours since the mid-1970s.

Like, um, I don't know. Uh, h- is there, are there cultural changes that have to be made to really jumpstart this- I, I think- ... innovation process? I, I think one of the things that we saw with the ChatGPT [00:14:00] coming and the consumer, uh, grade and everyone has now access to this, I think clients are understanding they...

Or they are saying, "We don't longer want a black box of legal services." And I think that is what, what we are, um, what, what is impacting the, the, the change and that forces people to think differently. Um, I think also the, the education in the universities, and I had some meetings this week about, uh, how, again, picking up on what everyone is saying, how to train the new generation, what it is.

The lawyer of today will be completely different of the lawyer of tomorrow, and we are seeing that on, um, maybe some of them, they don't want to be partners. Maybe some of them don't want to really be lawyers. They just, uh, feel much more comfortable doing technology or doing other things. And I think all this will force the [00:15:00] innovation and by innovation is it's just finding a different way to continue to deliver services.

Um, and I think that will be the great innovation and, and I'm not, not saying that law firms will become consultants or Big Four, um, but- I, I, I, I give you a small, maybe stupid example. When I walk from my home to, to the office, I pass three, uh, travel agencies. Three. It's like two kilometers, my home to the office.

And some years ago, everyone would say internet will, will kill the travel agency, and so on. But they reinvented, they did a different thing. They maybe become more, uh, advisory or, or whatever. And I think that is an example. They just adapt. Maybe they make a bit less money. But I always think about this, everyone was killing the travel agencies, and they are there.

And I think it's what [00:16:00] will happen a bit with the law firm. They will find the right spot. Uh, we'll see the, um, as we saw this week on the news, the big ones will buy and build their own platforms. Maybe the small ones be- will become more boutique. Um, and then there is a, um, a middle layer where some of them, they need to take hard decisions, uh, what to do.

Um, and maybe is, are we doing full service law firm against the big boys, or are we just focusing in one sector and/or practice or as expertise, and then we, we go with the boutiques that are already tech-enabled, and so on. I think that will be also what will force the innovation. Yeah, I think, um, I think the middle market is a bit vulnerable, to be candid.

Um, I-- to your point, I think the big, the big firms have the partner capital to deploy and build [00:17:00] infrastructure and make organizational investments that, let's say, the second hundred in the Am Law here in the US, uh, they don't have that capital. Yeah. And their choices are stand up an MSO, um, narrow their focus, niche down, um, and I, I think there are gonna be some hard decisions in that middle market, and, um, I think there's gonna be some consolidation as well.

I, I think that, I think that firms, um, who, you know, I see a K shape trajectory forming, and there are firms on the upward leg of the K that are making the hard decisions now and making the investments now and really aligning the organization to the goals of the transformation. And there's a lot of firms that are slow playing it and, and I, I know this for a fact.

I mean, we, we, [00:18:00] I talk to them frequently. You see, you see that every day. It's your job. Yes, exactly. And, um, yeah, I see varying levels of investment and the firms that are on the downward leg of the K, as, as those legs start to diverge more dramatically, which they will, I don't think they can catch up. And the reason I don't think they can is because so much of the work that has to be done is people work, and you can't fast track that, right?

It's like, you know, they say nine women can't have a baby in, in one month. Exactly. Exactly. Exactly. It takes time. I don't know. Do, do you s- are you seeing the K shaped as well? And then do you think firms on the downward leg w- are gonna be able to catch up if they need to? I, I, I think they, they will, they will be a moment of for a wake up call and I think we will see soon one, one big sign and then everyone will follow [00:19:00] to do whatever will be that sign, if it's closing doors or big, or mergers or, or creating networks of, of whatever, or downsizing.

Um, I agree with you. The answer is really not technology. Um, I think it's more the people because-- And it's not only on legal, it's, it, it's people, it's, it's, this seems all from the books, but it's always people processing data. Technology is just It's just not there alone and so on. And I think the ones that will tackle the changes they need to do, and like you said, taking or investment decisions or downsizing or, or up- or upskilling or bringing more people will be the ones that will drive.

Because I still believe there, there will be a market for everyone, maybe a different market with a more sophisticated buyer, [00:20:00] maybe with a buyer that will not give so much to the external counsel. But then you also need to tackle what this new buyer wants. Maybe this buyer doesn't want to give you the review of a contract but wants to do, to give you a big project of compliance or regulatory, or wants, uh, specific advice in an area they, they don't have their, um, legal department.

And I think n- people, uh, law firms needs to adapt on that. Um, and I, I think this will be several shifts and it will come to a different world. To what is that different world, I really don't know. But I tend to agree with you that we will need more people or law firms will need more people. But like I said before, a complete different set of, of people.

Um, and maybe they are just there. They just need a bit [00:21:00] of recycling, refresh or, um, a mindset, uh, explosion and say, "Let's not do like this. Let's do like that." Yeah. I, I've used this example on the podcast before. I have a friend who's a chief information officer. He's a great guy and he's brought, he's brought me in to multiple firms when he's moved.

And, um, so I'm obviously a big fan. And, um, he told me, "Ted, I, my, I have my job, I have to do two things, keep the lights on and spend as little money as possible." And so he by default has a very change resistant mindset. In fact, he has been hand selected because of his resistance to change. He just says no to vendors.

He only says yes to me because I know him and he, and he's familiar with our tech and otherwise you, you're never gonna get through, uh, to him. And [00:22:00] there are people like that scattered all throughout business of law functions where literally they line 10 people up on a short list and said, "Okay, which one's the most change resistant?

Let's pick that guy or girl." And th- that dynamic is real as well. Mm-hmm. And, um, it's not true in every, in every case- Yeah ... but there is a lot of, there is a lot of it. And then the question becomes, are those the right people to lead us through a transformation, right? Are they going to, uh, be able to adapt?

Look, they are the, the change, the change needs to happen and happens every day, right? The world doesn't stop just for that is, is a change. There are people more adverse to change, of course, but I'm not sure if they will resist forever. And I, I think more and more we'll see evidence that or the business model or the, the financials or [00:23:00] the technology, they need to change.

I, I will, I will challenge your friend saying he's still running on-premise everything that he does. Maybe it still works, but does it make sense on financials? Is, uh, uh, not able to connect your document management system with the, the, um, clouds and, uh, OpenAI by MCPs, and then having 300 partners screaming why the others are doing and I'm not doing.

I, I think resistant to change i- to some e- aspect is good, but I will not call it resistant to change. It's changing by changing, I think, because you said there are so many vendors that arrive and, and tell you, tell you the silver bullet of everything and everyone goes to that direction. Or a partner saw on CNN or BBC that now Anthropic has a, a cloud for legal, let's change everything.

Um, [00:24:00] I will, I will say that it's a dynamic and there are people more risky and le- less risky. Uh, some of them that think a bit bigger. There are those that think a bit, um, more strategic. It's also depending on the environment where you are, right? If your... If the environment where you are gives you the ability to experiment, to, to fail and fail safe and learn from that, maybe it will be the people that will say, "We don't need to change because under the hood we are, or behind the scenes we already tested, we already know what works and doesn't work."

Um, and I think that That is the way that should be and, and I don't think that your, your friend, client, um, is wrong. Maybe he has evidence of saying, "Okay, I have a mandate that doesn't allow me to change my vendor every week or every month because I [00:25:00] have a KPI that is our financial or this or, or training."

Um, but I think everyone change in the end of the day. I don't know anyone that didn't bought a new shirt or try to use a, a, another, uh, pair of sneakers or, or, or decided to change the, the, the, the toothbrush that uses because wants to try another one. Everyone changes. It's just a bit of a process. Yeah.

Well, speaking of change, you, you guys had a, a large rollout of a, of a practice solution and, um, like what did you learn as you-- 'Cause I think you started off with a fairly small pilot and rolled that out more broadly within the firm. Like what, what were some of the key learnings as you were implementing change within your firm?

Yeah. That was a very... Even for me, for me was a new process and, and I think that it also shows how the legal [00:26:00] tech market changed in the last three years. Um, what, what I learned is The organic demand is the best way. Champions, real stories, uh, peer-to-peer, uh, comments. It worked much better than any top-down mandate.

Any. Um, also we stop saying, "Oh, you need to give us 20 use cases," or, uh, "We need to record this." We give, we gave the people space to discover their use cases, what was meaningful for them, and I think that was the best exercise. No one felt, "Oh, on Friday I need to register in a SharePoint page, uh, the 20 use cases, and I save 20 minutes, or maybe I save..."

And I was fort- uh, very fortunate to be in a organization that didn't put [00:27:00] any big guidelines. Was, "Okay, let's put this out there. Let's run this for a very long period of time." We did a, um, proof of concept of six months. I never did something. That means first month, no one care. We had 50, 50 users. On the fourth month, we needed to stop the, uh, accepting people to trial because we reach out almost 900 users.

If you think the organization where I have is, uh, 1,800 lawyers, half of the- them were just trialing a, a, a product. And I, I think we also give this Ability that the individual understood what needs to do, but was able to shape their own needs to the organizational, um, to the organization and what we could deliver and how we b-brought this firm-wide, I think was on top of the individual.

And I [00:28:00] think people f-felt empowered, um, to contribute. I, I think in the past you, you give a tool and you say, "Okay, do this, do that." And in this case, people were just saying, "I want this. I think this is better." Um, and again, I was also f-very fortunate because we at that time, we decided to not go with the vendor or startup or whatever you want to call it, that everyone was going.

Because I remember to have a conversation with my CTO and she said, "We are not looking for the biggest vendor. We are looking for product quality, speed, and the ability to shape." And the best example that I c- I can give you was one of our senior associates was in our cafeteria in London, sitting with the [00:29:00] CEO of that, uh, startup and basically told him, "Look, you need to bring the product to inside Word.

That is where I spend nine hours of my day." Next week, we were sitting in a workshop saying, "Okay, how do we think this? How you think that?" And that is the biggest learning. I know that times are different, but I think was also what I call an alignment of stars. There was a, uh, a C-level that said, "Let's try it differently.

Uh, let's see how this goes. If we fail, we fail relatively small. If we don't fail, this is a very, very good story to, to move forward." And here we are. So how much, how much gain can be had with that method of-- Because I'm assuming what happened was you didn't stop, you [00:30:00] didn't like reorganize and re-engineer the processes from first principles.

You gave users a tool to use the way, on top of the way they already work. And I think there's opportunity to gain incremental efficiencies that way. But to really, you know, um, to really transform the outcome, it feels like it will require some re-engineering of how things are done and a little more consistency, right?

Like legal is a very bespoke process- Mm-hmm ... right? Lawyers l- you know, sitting in the same office right next to each other may go about delivering the work differently from a process perspective. So, you know, at what point, and you guys may or, or m- or, or may not have started the process of really trying to re-engineer a lot of the operate the company more [00:31:00] predictable workflows.

Like when, when does that start or when did it start for, for you guys? Let, let's maybe just slice, slice the things a bit before. First, I think we are, we had a moment of pull, basically where users dragging us forward, was users telling this is due. Then when that slowed down a bit, was very, very interesting that people gained the trust in the platforms.

Uh, and that show me that ownership drives the adoption because they felt empowered to, "I want more. I want to, I want to go to my department meeting and showing what I do. I want support from the training teams to understand how I'm changing my workflows." Then We needed, [00:32:00] and this was also again organic, we s- we needed to scale the understanding even before AI.

I can tell you that before we decided to start the proof of concept, we hired consultants, uh, we had, uh, um, Josh Kubicki that you know quite well, uh, coming to us talking about his, "Oh, this is how the future will be. This is AI," and so on. And only after that we started to, what we can call, to your question, a moment of embedding s- things, really the real work.

Um, everyone will say, "Oh, the next chapter is workflow." To be fair, we are still in that process, and I will, I, I will say that that process is continuous. Um, and it is where people now start to think, "Okay, I really need to change how I integrate [00:33:00] this on real work," um, because it comes simple from moving AI assistance that all of these tools were to really processes and client delivery, uh, being collaboration, being different ways of, of generating work or output.

I, I think this is where we are and it's a, it's um, a constant work, a day-to-day work because we know not all lawyers will open the tool in the morning. Maybe some they will only work when remember when they are really under pressure, or some of them will say, "Oh, do you know that someone in Germany is doing exactly the same work inside the platform, has a playbook and so on?"

I think this will never be 100%, maybe in one or two generations of lawyers. But to be very fair, it's not, at least on my organization, and I'm being very [00:34:00] honest here, and I, I care a, a bit less how, what the others say is, it's not yet there. We have our challenges. Uh, people some- sometimes say, "I always did it this way."

And, and we respect that. It's... Because maybe we, it's not to be changed. Not everything needs to be changed. Um, and very in, in very specific areas of law, uh, maybe in Europe is a bit different from the US, there are really things that you cannot, uh, cannot do. Um, and I think, I think we are in step four, maybe it will be a step five, that is how we monetize all of this in a completely different way, but not yet there.

Yeah. That makes sense. What about, like, building AI fluency across your firm? Like, uh, h- what was the... H- how did you go about that?

I think it's, it's still a [00:35:00] process, um, es-especially when you operate in these regulated environments that we are. We created a network of digital champions. We create, um, uh, digital academies. We partnership with, uh, content providers. Uh, we made, um, nothing that others don't do, to be fair. Um, we try to, to do, to do different things.

We, we run a, a l- what we call a legal tech roadshow where my team goes and sits with vendors and do two days in different offices, flying a bit e-everywhere. Um, in the other day we did a, uh, an internal, um, almost a marketplace. We brought all the vendors to our, um, exhibition area and, and, and we demonstrate.

But I think it, it's also sitting with the management, the heads of departments, the head of practices, and tell [00:36:00] them, "This is h- what we need to do," and come-- and there without any doubt comes from drill down. Um, the best example that I, I, I had is in the German Christmas party last year, arrives one partner, a very, very high-profile partner with some hats saying, "This is my digital champion."

And on the Christmas party was giving these hats and say, "This guy helped me to change the way that I work, and this is-- he made me see the future." And I think this top-down approach also helps. A-and then you continue to build a flow into you, like you do in any other things. You do training for soft skills, you do training for business development, you do training for AI on judgment and what is, uh, AI-- usage of AI, uh, responsible, uh, responsible AI, what is the...

We also have the, the modules of the basics, uh, what is LLM, what is [00:37:00] change. Um, it's working quite well. Uh, I'm not saying that there was not n- of course there are gaps, but I think even from the business service population, I will say that everyone feels comfortable with the use of, uh, any tool being a, a commercial one or en-enterprise level.

Because they also use on their day-to-day and we just say, "Okay, this is the guardrails that you need to have, and this is how operate and these are the dangers and these are the benefits." Interesting. And, um, you and I spoke a little bit last time about, like, what, w- how are firms going to differentiate themselves in this post-transformation world?

And I, I, for a long time, I was a believer that the data, the collective knowledge and wisdom of the firm as it gets systematized would be the differentiator. And I've, I've changed my, my- Mm-hmm ... stance on that [00:38:00] topic. I, I, I no longer believe that to be... I think that is going to be necessary but not sufficient to differentiate.

What I think is going to differentiate law firms is how the learning loops that, that, that they build and how they extract the tacit knowledge that exists in partners head, heads and build that into systems that tech enable the practice, and that the real differentiator is going to be how it's going to be more go-to-market focused and how firms package and price their services in alignment with market expectations.

Um, I-- do you, do you believe that to be the case or do you see firms differentiating themselves differently? No, I, I, I, I think you are completely right. I think, I think we also need to stop looking at LinkedIn posts and, uh, this firm adopted this tool, this firm adopted that tool, is I think [00:39:00] people continue to say, "Oh, this is how AI fits the law firm."

While I think we should start saying how it will look a law firm where AI is everywhere. You go to the airport and you see advertisings of, uh, AI TV. You saw the, the World Cup, uh, football that was, or soccer as you say in the US, they are in the, the every, every repetition was powered by AI. The, the referee has a almost a helmet with AI.

AI is everywhere. That means how the law firm will adapt, how the f- the, uh, will redesign. I think that is again to the, our previous topic is the redesign of legal services and how they are created, how they are delivered. And I will m- maybe be a bit, uh Uh, [00:40:00] not, not following the standards here is how we deliver the client experience.

Because when you go to a retail shop or when you go buying your furniture, you have the client experience, right? You enter in a coffee, um, like this, uh, capsules of coffee, is an experience when you enter in the, in the shop. I think the, the experience right, uh, for law firms was who has the biggest, uh, um, meeting room and what is the, the most fancy, uh, sofa that is in the reception.

And but I think that is, that time is gone, and I think the client experience is... Because the clients will assume, and they are already doing that, that AI is used. They know it's, if it's in a tool A, a tool B, I think they will judge how their experience improved. And, and to your point in [00:41:00] the other day, you had a post about the, uh, the, the invoice or how it bill and, and so on.

And I think that is where the clients will start saying, "This client experience for me improved because it's more transparent. I know wh- that the technology is using, but this is the outcome. This is what I got it faster, I got it with higher quality. I got still with the risk management that I'm paying to my lawyer.

And by the way, was a bit cheaper than in the past." Um, or more expensive because there are clients that will pay even more to, to do the, the work but, and they accept that. And I think that is, um, where we need to go, is stop asking if we use AI or not. Even to be fair, when we see all these client questionnaires, how do you use AI?

W- we ever, if we don't use, the client will tell us why you are not using to gain efficiencies, but then they put these questionnaires out there saying, "Do you use AI?" It's a bit, [00:42:00] uh, um, a circle Yeah. So yeah, that's something we're thinking about a lot at Info Dash, is how do law firms go about demonstrating the efficiencies?

Because there is a tension building inside the corporate legal teams where they're getting pressure from their CFOs and CEOs to reduce external legal spend. And right now it feels like, I don't know if you have a different take on this, but it feels like our law firms are still figuring out how to deliver on those efficiencies.

They've got the press releases with their new chief AI officer. They've got the press releases with, you know, that they've just adopted Harvey or Legora. Mm-hmm. But the law firm clients are looking at their bill and going, "I'm-- My bill's not changing." Um, so I'm curious, like, how firms are thinking about h-how do we demonstrate to clients [00:43:00] n-not that we're using a tool or that we have a chief AI officer, but how do we demonstrate to them that we're either improving quality, um, increasing efficiencies, or both?

How, how do we, how do we go about demonstrating that? I, I think it picks up a-again on the transparency, is we need to be very clear that we are redesigning the business model, and that comes with what the client really wants and cannot only be the reduction of the fees. The client wants more or wants in a different way, or is willing to pay the same because gets more value.

And I think the measure of value is the, is the tricky part, but also the, the real need that everyone needs to tackle. What is the value? Um, and in a world that was ruled by the billable hour and so on, now again, you need to value the outcomes. And I think that is how we can do [00:44:00] that is we need to sit with the clients, we need to collaborate with the clients.

We need to be also very honest to the client saying, "We cannot do that," or, "You need, uh, you cannot do that internally." Because I also think that- If they will reduce the, the external spend or the external advice, they will take more on board. To your point before of the nine pregnant women is, do they need more people or they will also be reduced?

And if they are reduced, where the work goes, goes back to the law firm, it's, it's an entire mindset change and lots of hard questions and even harder, uh, answers needs to pop up, um, because it's not only one side of the coin is, okay, you reduce external spend, but what that means for you means that in the last 20 years, something didn't work so well, [00:45:00] or the technology is there, or the process changes, or are you willing to share your workflows with the law firm and work together in a collaboration?

Um, maybe, maybe when I'm retired, this will be answered or not, but, uh, not sure. Yeah. Fair, very fair. Um, when we were, when we were, uh, hammering out the agenda, you had mentioned, you know, the need to treat matter, matters as project and lawyers as innovation architects. And, um, you know, LPM, legal project management, has really not gained the foothold that I would have anticipated.

It makes so much sense in my mind, but lawyers, um, have resisted. Um, I'm s- using broad brushstrokes here. It's obviously not true across the board, but in many, in many are- there have been pockets where LPM has gained traction, and now that we're entering in a tech-enabled era where technology is going [00:46:00] to assist with, uh, service delivery, I think th- the LPM conversation becomes, uh, much more relevant.

W- would you agree? Yeah. That, that is my point before, that law firms needs to be different. They need more technologies, they need project managers, they need product managers. Uh, they need a, a set, a complete set of skills, and I said it before, maybe just recycling some of the people and some of the, uh, areas that are there, because A law firm will be a complete different, uh, business, uh, with maybe partners doing a type of work and delegating much more of the work they do.

I think areas like project management, even legal design and so on, they never get the, the value that you and myself expected because there was a relation of trust. [00:47:00] And now I think the mar- the world is coming to a m- to an area where this trust needs to be built, otherwise there is no, no option to, to do the things for yourself.

That means you need to trust in other areas, you need to trust in other people, and that will then build the fluency and build the embedded stuff. And maybe in five years we'll have a team of, of legal project managers and legal des- uh, designers and product owners or product, uh, designers doing what lawyers are doing today.

Um, I think that is where it goes. I also never understood why legal project manag- uh, management didn't fly. I think it's really because... And again, this is very generic and, uh, based on my experience in different law firms and doing this for 25 years. I think it's really a question of trust, is [00:48:00] why I need someone outside of my remit to tell me how I should do the work.

And sometimes they really use them, but I think it was more an somehow an assistant rather than someone driving a project. Yeah. I don't disagree. Well, we're almost out of time. One, one final question for you. You and I talked a little bit about how, how non-lawyer professionals, um, business professionals are recruited, valued, compensated, empowered, and I believe, and I, I think you agree based on our conversations, that we need a rethinking of some of that.

Um, you know, historically, the practice has been the center of the universe inside a law firm, and now we're entering into an era where a legal engineer may be just as important as a lawyer in getting work out the door. Um, you know, how do we... A-and there's so much cultural [00:49:00] inertia that we have to pivot because, again, the practice has always been the center of the universe.

Um, how do we get there? Because that, th- there are some cultural, there's some cultural friction towards that goal, and we gotta figure out how to iron that out. Yeah. Um, I, I think, I think it's, again, this thing that I'm using since some years, the, the architect of, uh, innovation or whatever, because the future of the fir- of a firm, I think, is multidisciplinary.

Um, like I said, is what we need to go is a firm needs to have a multidisciplinary team to a one client output, o- outcome or output, and that is the, the future. The future is no long, uh, that will not be built only by lawyers. Um, I think The empowerment that is needed [00:50:00] needs to be pointed very carefully because this needs credible career paths that, to be fair, the industry was not good on that.

Right decisions. Um, you touched, um, the rewarding and recognition and so on. We know there is a gap between what we call business services and lawyers. Uh, in the other day I saw, uh, I think it's a US firm because a recruiter putting on LinkedIn that, uh, was looking for someone, a C-level, and was a seven-digit salary.

That means we start to see a, a difference. But I start working in a law firm when I was 16, and I was embedded how lawyers worked. And one thing that I learned, and I continue to tell all my bosses, is I need to generate revenue to pay my salary and bring more to the partnership. And I think that is also [00:51:00] the mindset that people need to think is a resource needs to generate value, um, independent if it's a junior support staff or a junior lawyer.

And I think that mindset is one team or a firm working together to generate one, and it's not the allocation of the hours in individual A or B or C. I think it's, it's more like a true corporation, to be fair. Yeah. But, but yeah. Ver- very true. Um, okay. Well, we'll have to leave it there. Helder, it was a fantastic conversation.

I knew- Thank you ... it would be. Um, we'll be, uh, we'll be over at Legal Geek here in a, in a couple months and hope to get to, to meet in person. Um- Yeah ... how do, uh, how do folks find out more about Bird & Bird and, and, and what you do there? Uh, well, [00:52:00] th- this part is still Googling us. There is lots of things, but I'm also quite, uh, active on s- social media, the firm also.

Uh, what I didn't say and, uh, uh, Bird & Bird is also very well-known on the, the tech, um, area. Um, for example, Bird & Bird was the first UK law firm to have a, a website, uh, was the first, uh, uh- European law firm to have a computer in all desks of the, of the, of the lawyers. Uh, I think we registered the first patent on computers.

Has... Bird & Bird is doing 180 years right now, and if I, I arrived three years ago, and without any doubt, this DNA of innovation and, uh, it's there. And I think, in a very honest way, it's because we work with so much advanced clients that our lawyers are [00:53:00] seeing the future when advising this type of clients.

That also forces to be there. It's a bit peer pressure, right? If you are advising, I don't know, a client on the next go to the moon, uh, go to Mars and live in Mars, you need to think outside of the box and live in tw- 20 years because the clients don't want the advice for now, they want the cl- the advice for the future, and I think that also is very, uh, embedded in, in the organization.

Awesome. Well, that's great. All right. Well, we hate to- hope to see you in a couple weeks and, um- Yep ... I, uh, again, I really appreciate the time today. Thank you. Thank you, Ted. All right. Thanks, Helder. Thanks for listening to Legal Innovation Spotlight. If you found value in this chat, hit the subscribe button to be notified when we release new episodes.

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