Author: Richard Susskind and Daniel Susskind

ISBN: 978-0198799078

Though the title would imply the book to be relevant for all professions, it is focused on the legal profession. The legal profession is one one the professions that is among the most reluctant to be changed by the latest technology (blockchain, AI etc.). But one can only resist a current for so long before he is swept away. A must read book for lawyers, who want to thrive in the 21st century! By the way, the book was recommended to me by exceptionally well read and forward-thinking CEO of a big multi-national subsidiary in Slovenia. Many clients might not yet be at his level and aware of just how outdated the rendering of the legal services is. But the tide is rising. Don't forget to learn how to swim!

EXCERPTS

[I've read this book in paper form. Instead of the usual excerpts I am providing my notes and thoughts.]

The book does in my opinion apply to services "industry". Producers and sellers of goods shall in my opinion above all read books about marketing!

We know very well how to store knowledge, but not how to distribute it.

The technology advanced so much in the recent years yet lawyers adopted only e-mail communication and word text editor. Where are smart contracts, contract automation software, cooperation software (Teams, Slack, Zoom etc.), computer reading etc.?

Don't foster people to do the work that machines do better. (Saddly that's exactly what our current school system is doing. We are rewarding students for memorizing and reproducing existing knowledge. We are signaling them that it's good to be a worker bee in a world where machines are taking up all routine tasks. Sure, we should teach them the basics. But then, we should foster their creativity. We should make students love continuous learning (learning by doing!).)

The difficulty lies not in new ideas but in escaping from the old ones that occupy every corner of our minds.

There is a limited number of best professionals (in any given field). Due to their time constraints the best professionals can only serve a tiny minority. The law of supply and demand results in the best professionals only being available to the highest bidders (wealthy individuals and companies). The rest are left with poorer quality. The technology has the potential to turn the tables around. With the help of technology the best could bypass the time constraints. They could offer the highest quality services that could be standardised at a lower cost to a wider audience thereby increasing their profits and making their expertise available to wide(r) audience (democratization of knowledge!).

Technology enables that work of the best professionals is affordable to all + transparency (pricing).

Professionals are above all solution to a limited knowledge. So they should strive to distribute knowledge efficiently above all; digitalization, automation, embedded knowledge etc.

Similarly e-learning has potential to revolutionize the school system:

• TOP universities (among them Harvard, Yale, MIT, Princeton, Stanford) are already offering all their lectures online!
• It is easy to track progress and compliance (e.g. fingerprint/ face recognition when listening/ viewing the lectures)
• Each student could learn from the best professors at his own pace. Why should the best and the brightest attend college for 5 years if they could get all the knowledge within a year? Why waste precious years?
• I don't believe in testing of knowlege during schooling. Employers increasingly understand that academic record doesn't mean much if a person has no will or knowledge to apply their knowledge. So the trend is that employers either demand from the candidates to show their work (GitHub, webistes, work experience etc.) or test their knowledge.

Parties wish that lawyers charged by the result and not the hours. For now the lawyers are defending the status quo (payment by hourly rate). But not for long. Sooner or later their routine tasks will be charged by the result and only non-routine task by hourly rate. Also, when charging by hourly rate, the rate should be contingent on the task complexity (easier tasks for juniors, more complex for seniors).

Many law firms should tightly cooperate (or even employ!) accountants, tax advisors etc.

In-house dispute resolution or smart-contract clearing.

Examples:

• contractexpress, exari, docracy, legalzoom, rocketlawyer,
• Wikistrat, ideo, kaggle; crowdsourced consultancy
• Online Harvard MBA: HBX 1500€

Technology (tools) have the potential to empower in-house legal counsel or even non-lawyers to draft legal documents of the same quality as top law firms.

State: simplifying payment of taxes (for companies and individuals) and preparation of annual accounts.

Web has mountains of information that requires sorting/ applying/ reviewing by specialists.

We use technology to store but not yet to extract and apply information.

We should not let the best be the enemy of good (Voltaire).

Further reading: Christopher Millard - Cloud Computing Law