Pioneers and Pathfinders

Today’s guest is Alex Smith, Global Product Management Lead for iManage RAVN. He got his start at legal publishing giant LexisNexis, where he began in online editorial work and eventually evolved his role to product management and platform innovation. An interest in new roles in law firms led to his time as innovation manager at Reed Smith, a global firm where he oversaw the firm’s Innovation Hub program that encouraged, communicated, connected, and managed a pipeline of ideas across the firm's global network. Today, he oversees the product roadmap for the search, knowledge, and AI offerings within the wider iManage experience, bringing the voice, needs, and ideas of the customer in service design. The common thread in his career journey is his fascination with search and data, and the evolution of new and emerging technologies, from CD-ROM to contract management, artificial intelligence, semantic search, and linked data. In many ways, Alex’s career maps the evolution of technology in the legal sector. Our conversation flashes back to the early days of online legal publishing up to today's emerging technologies. We talk about Alex's various work experiences, and how he uses lawyers’ penchant for talking about themselves in his work in product design. We also discuss how he has been at the core of some of the critical technology products in the legal industry.

Contracts are a hot topic in education, technology innovation, and practice in the legal industry. In fact, we've had several guests on the show focused on those aspects of contract management, but today's guest focuses on contract formation. She asks a simple, but important question: Can we learn to do a better job of negotiating and drafting better contracts? Laura Frederick is the founder and CEO of How to Contract. Drawn from her 26 years practicing contract law, How To Contract teaches real-world skills in negotiating and drafting contracts. The formation of How To Contract is a fascinating story. Two years ago, Laura began sharing daily contracting tips as part of a 30-day challenge of posting on LinkedIn. The reaction to these posts was overwhelmingly positive, and Laura went from 1,000 followers on LinkedIn to more than 33,000 followers today. This, in turn, led to her book, Practical Tips on How to Contract. Laura also launched How To Contract, the global leader in practical contract training for lawyers and professionals. Through its training membership and events, it has helped thousands of people learn how to manage contract risk and get deals done. Laura is also the managing attorney of Laura Frederick Law, PLLC, a boutique law firm based in Austin, Texas that helps companies that need practical and affordable advice on commercial contracts. In today's conversation, we talk about Laura’s use of social media and her move to being an entrepreneur. We also discuss what ignited Laura's love of contracts, how and why she addresses the human side of contracting at a time when technology dominates, and the influence of SeyfarthLean on her evolution.

Mishcon de Reya is one of the most unique and fascinating law firms in the world. Today’s guest, Elliot Moss, is the mind behind Mishcon’s brand. Elliot is chief brand officer and a partner at Mishcon, a 600 fee-earner firm headquartered in London. This unique combination of roles is made possible by the Legal Services Act 2007 in the UK. Elliot has overall responsibility for brand, marketing, communications, client development, new business, and social impact for the firm. He comes from the world of advertising, having worked for Leo Burnett and Leagas Delaney. It was here that he first met Mishcon’s managing partner—now executive chairperson—Kevin Gold. After a two-year contract with the firm, Elliot stayed on, attracted by what he calls the great “volume of intellectual capital” in the law. Since then, he has become the first nonlawyer to be named as one of the Financial Times' 10 Most Innovative Individuals. He also happens to have a long-running podcast called Jazz Shapers, where he interviews founders and entrepreneurs on their own professional journeys. It was a fascinating and wide-ranging conversation. We discussed the cultural attributes that make Mishcon such an innovative and unique firm. We also veered into a number of other intriguing topics. For example, the firm recently sponsored a film from The Economist on the culture wars, which is not typical for a law firm, and we talked about how their atypical branding moves are “utterly rational.” We also talked about why he made the leap from consumer-oriented branding to the law, how he made the case for Mishcon to make him a partner, and what's next for their IPO—and how he sold it to his partners.

It's always a delight to talk to people who are passionate about what they do. Dr. Silvia Hodges Silverstein is such a person. She researches, teaches, and speaks on purchasing decisions and change in the legal industry. Silvia is the CEO of Buying Legal Council, which supports professionals tasked with sourcing legal services and legal tech through education, research, and advocacy. Their mission is to advance the field of buying legal services and legal tech by sharing intelligence and best practices on how to buy and manage supplier relationships. Silvia is the editor of The Definitive Guide to Buying Legal Services and has authored two Harvard Business School case studies on legal procurement and the legal industry. She has also taught management at Columbia Law School and Fordham University School of Law. Our conversation covered a number of interesting topics. We talked about how Silvia's journey in marketing for an Italian law firm led to her interest and expertise in procurement, the evolution of procurement's role in buying legal services and the ongoing struggle between lawyers and procurement professionals, and her view on which pricing model is least used by in-house counsel and the reason why.

Jennifer Leonard is the University of Pennsylvania Carey Law School's chief innovation officer and the executive director of the Future of the Profession Initiative. As chief innovation officer, Jennifer advances projects that evolve our understanding of the skills and knowledge lawyers need to thrive in a rapidly changing professional landscape. She and her colleagues also develop multidisciplinary projects that engage law students with creative thinkers from the Wharton School, Penn Engineering, the School of Nursing, and more to design solutions and make civil legal systems more accessible. In today's episode, Jennifer tells us about her groundbreaking role as the first and only chief innovation officer at a law school, how she is using design thinking to collaborate across Penn and with peers at other law schools, and her advice for creative law students who want to enter the world of Big Law—as well as her advice for those firms.

Zach Posner is a three-time entrepreneur turned investor. He is working to find ways that artificial intelligence can be used to positively affect the world. To that end, Zach is the co-founder and managing partner at The LegalTech Fund, which is the first venture capital fund to focus exclusively on legal tech. Founded in 2020 post-pandemic, the Fund recently closed to $28.5 million, exceeding its goal of $25 million. The vision of The LegalTech Fund is to bring together a community of the world's most forward-thinking experts and advisors to accelerate innovation in the legal world. In today's conversation, we talked about how this finance major came to invest in legal tech, the criteria Zach looks for when he makes investments, and his plans for the inaugural The LegalTech Fund Summit coming in December.

The past few years have seen a rise in heads of innovation at Big Law firms. One of the leading voices in this space is David Wang, Wilson Sonsini Goodrich & Rosati’s chief innovation officer. David is responsible for overseeing the firm's innovation strategy, the development and implementation of legal technology programs, and supporting and advising both internal and client teams on the legal and operational implications of emerging technologies and business models. He previously practiced corporate and securities law for more than 10 years, working with private and public companies on general corporate and transactional matters. Prior to becoming a lawyer, David was an entrepreneur himself. Under David’s leadership, Wilson has received multiple accolades for their innovative use of technology. In today's conversation, we discuss how David transitioned from the practice of law to leading a cutting-edge innovation and technology team at a Big Law firm, how he manages his portfolio of responsibilities, his decision-making process for taking on new projects, and what excites him most in the legal tech market.

JusticeText, an MIT- and Google-backed startup, is building technology to improve criminal justice outcomes for low-income Americans. Today's guest is Devshi Mehrotra, JusticeText CEO and co-founder. She started this work when she was a computer science undergraduate at the University of Chicago, while the city was reeling from the death of Laquan McDonald. Devshi and co-founder Leslie Jones-Dove began their work helping public defenders better utilize large volumes of admissible video and audio data. Today, JusticeText is an audiovisual evidence management platform that expedites review of collective video and audio data with machine learning to support the work of public defenders. Devshi talks to us about how falling in love with the problem helped her go against her natural risk aversion, how participating in startup programs and accelerators contributed to the success of JusticeText, and how she is building a strong company culture.

Tony Thai is an attorney, entrepreneur, and software engineer. He founded and serves as CEO and chief engineer of HyperDraft, a company which builds bespoke document automation software for law firms and legal departments. Prior to his legal career, Tony worked as an enterprise software engineer. An M&A venture capital attorney by training, his goal was always to build tech to disrupt the profession. To learn how lawyers practice and how the law is delivered, Tony practiced at some of the world's most prestigious law firms, as well as in-house at multiple technology companies. He was recently recognized as a Fastcase 50 honoree, and serves as an adjunct professor at USC Gould School of Law. In today's conversation, we talk about why Tony embraces all the boring stuff nobody else wants to do; how a desire to understand how humans think led to his work in machine learning, software, and algorithms; and how HyperDraft is a culmination of every experience he has had.

We've had a number of guests on the show focused on the A2J gap, as well as issues of social justice, but today's guest, Jazz Hampton, combines both. Jazz is CEO and general counsel at TurnSignl, a Minnesota-based tech company that he co-founded in the wake of the deaths of Philando Castile and George Floyd. TurnSignl is a mobile app where the user, if stopped for a traffic violation or involved in an accident, can push a button and be connected automatically to an attorney to receive real-time, on-demand legal guidance. The goal of the app is to keep drivers safe and empowered while speaking with law enforcement. Before joining TurnSignl, Jazz was the director of diversity and inclusion and a practicing attorney at a national law firm. Among other roles, Jazz has won a number of accolades, most recently being named to Fastcase 50. Join us for a fascinating conversation about TurnSignl’s growth plans, how this first-generation college student ended up in law school, and how a mentor made all the difference when Jazz was starting out.