Solutions before Tech: The under utilisation of law students and graduates as a subsection of law
- Author Contribution
- Dec 23, 2021
- 5 min read
By Thabo Magubane
In a period where we are witnessing a rapid rise of new legal technology solutions and the establishment of new roles in the legal profession, there seems to be less spoken about one subsection. Law students and recent law graduates.
Using LinkedIn data, there are currently about 7 million people with a law student title and about 2 million with a law graduate. Quite a large number considering the vertical and diverse nature of the law profession. Using the 2015 report, The law Society of South African reported about 4 928 final year LLB students and 4 250 law graduates in the same year. [1] Which has significantly increased over the years. In 2020, the American Bar Association also reported an increased number of J.D. enrollment, at about 144,520 students. [2]
Law students and graduates are a significant segment in the profession of law, with essential skillsets such as legal research, writing, and the ability to support the everyday repetitive work of attorneys. In search of trying to deliver more value to clients at less price, where do they fit? Are they effectively utilised and taken into consideration when designing new models that can scale? What if the excitement on complex tech systems makes us overlook the primary solutions that sometimes can answer existing bargains.
In 2021, Troutman Pepper law firm is implementing a program where it will spend the spring semester working with law students to identify new markets and improve operations. [3] Chief Innovation Officer at Troutman Pepper, Will Gaus, said the program is between the law firm and law students in identifying business improvements while giving them the ability to gain practical legal experience. This program is one of a few examples where there is a complete utilisation of law students to benefit the work of lawyers, improve legal businesses and identify potential opportunities.
Throughout the globe, law students face difficulties in securing employment and practical experience opportunities. This is due to many reasons such as small and medium law firms having limited resources and operating with tight budgets, and the automation of laborious work. This leaves law students and graduates as a forgotten segment in the profession of law and ignoring the important skills they possess that can be leveraged to increase productivity and lower operational costs. The Troutman Pepper program is a relevant case study for this discussion, on how through collaborative methods between the profession's segments, innovative solutions can be brought to light. From the discussion conducted with law firm leaders and in-house counsels, here are the key points which they think law students and graduates can be utilised to address some of the operational backlogs they face on daily basis.
Affordable labour for small law firms. Many small and medium law firms are eager to compete in the growing field of legal innovation and the new ways of doing things. However, the perception created is that innovation means technology or a high-end expensive software which most cannot afford. This is not the case, as the Troutman case study is one of the examples showing that innovation does not necessarily have to mean technology, it can also mean a creative way of intersecting new forms of collaboration and different legal business aspects to deliver services in a more efficient way. With law studentgraduate and lawyer collaboration, legal businesses can optimize a well-stuffed organization at lower costs; as law students can be brought on a selected basis through paid and unpaid legal experience opportunities, while helping the organisation get more done at a lower spending rate.
Fresh minds with new ideas. This is not to say lawyers cannot come up with new ideas, however, based on the trend I have been noticing from consulting with my Legal Connection clients in South Africa, lawyers fear publicly speaking or introducing innovative ideas because their peers might look at them differently. As a result, they end up going-with-the-flow and maintaining the status quo. Going back to our case study of the Troutman Pepper program, the directors confirmed quite an interesting point that they will not interfere or tell students what to do, however they will let them lead and identify potential improvement and business opportunities.
A potential remote workforce to enhance scalability techniques. During the pandemic, financial management became a top priority for the survival of law firms, as they began to cut costs on different aspects they could. As a 2021 study shows that law firms that experienced the most growth during the pandemic were the ones that exercised better financial decisions. [4] According to this study, the exercise of better financial decision was attributed to cloud-based technologies and a single practice management solution to streamline routine tasks and foster strong engagement with lawyers working from home. Where does this fit in the context of law students and graduates? The pandemic has proved the remote work technique to be working and for other law firms resulting in significant improvements. To help solo practitioners, small and medium law firms, utilising law students and graduates as a remote tasks force is a model yet waiting to be fully explored in scaling legal businesses in the virtual economy.
Now, what is the analysis that can be deduced from this case study. Firstly, innovation does always have to mean technology. We can learn that it makes sense to start with exploring easily available segments and approaches in the profession which are underutilised and from there, one can start exploring possible connections, new forms of collaborations and packages to deliver accessible services at a larger scale. Secondly, the identification of new forms of collaboration can help us understand exiting flaws, causes, and further mitigate and discover opportunities which are overlooked.
Skipping the process of finding a solution and jumping to technology implementation can be quite a risky step for a law firm, as from my experience and discussion with my clients, the decision to purchase technology mostly stems from a friend-of-a-friend conversation. However, even though the business of law is fundamentally the same from a top view but from a micro level, law firm culture and systems play a significant role in deciding whether a particular technology will be effective or not, or will the team ever use it. I recommend designing systems, exhaust the available tools and segments, build primary team-based solutions, and then, use technology to scale them. On top of collaborative approaches, law firms can build tech roadmaps, entrances, and implementation strategies.
This can allow lawyers to make decisions based on destination and outcomes, not the immediate need of feeling left out. Which can deprive lawyers of developing siloed systems and data for continuous and documented progress. The Troutman Pepper scenario is a case study that cannot be ignored in building collaborative methods that can be scaled using technology.
In closing, it is important to look at innovation as a systems design approach rather than exclusively understanding it under the umbrella of technology. Law students and graduates make up a large segment of the legal profession. It is essential to start exploring the Troutman Pepper like kind of innovative strategies in realising the significant impact and value that law students and graduates can add in the improvement and delivery of legal services.
Notes
[1] Latest statistics on the legal profession, DE Rebus (2015), available at https://www.derebus.org.za/latest-statistics-legal-profession/.
[2] American Bar Association (2020) Standard 509 Information Report Data Overview, available at https://www.americanbar.org/content/dam/aba/administrative/legal_education_and_admissions_to_the_bar/statistics/2020-509-enrollment-summary-report-final.pdf.
[3] This firm is partnering with law students for new business ideas, Thomson Reuters (2021), available at https://www.reuters.com/legal/legalindustry/this-firm-is-partnering-with-law-students-new-business-ideas-2021-09-03/.
[4] Pandemic Performers Report 2021: How some law firms found growth in crisis, Thomson Reuters (2021), available at https://www.thomsonreuters.com/en-us/posts/legal/pandemic-performers-2021/.
About the Author
Thabo Magubane is the CEO & Founder of Legal Sparks, and a Business Development Manager at Legal Connection. He is one of the recognised voices in legal technology and innovation in Africa and passionate about building scalable legal business models in the platform economy. He continuously shares thoughts on legal innovation, technology and strategies to drive progress in the profession of law through technology tools. Opinions expressed are solely his own and do not express the views or opinions of the organisations he is part of.
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