Building an Innovative Legal Team: Key Takeaways from LegalTech Talk UK 2024

On June 13, 2024, Cyril Bachman (GGC, AMEOS Gruppe), Peter Wozny (Senior Legal Counsel, Btomorrow Ventures), Yara Owayyed (GC, YouLend), Carlos Eduardo C. Saba (CLO, North LATAM, Louis Dreyfus Company), and Lewis Bowman (Director of Regional Business Management, Axiom) came together at the LegalTech Talk UK 2024 conference to discuss strategies for building an innovative legal team in today's dynamic and competitive landscape. The engaging discussion covered several critical aspects of fostering innovation, including cultivating a growth mindset, leveraging technology and automation, investing in professional development, and integrating alternative legal service providers (ALSPs) like Axiom. Here are the key takeaways and actionable advice for legal leaders looking to build innovative teams: 

1. Cultivate a Growth Mindset 

Creating an environment that encourages experimentation, risk-taking, and learning from failure is essential for driving innovation within a legal team. By fostering a growth mindset, legal leaders can empower their teams to push boundaries, explore new ideas, and adapt to changing client needs and market dynamics. 

• Establish clear guidelines for acceptable risk-taking that align with the organisation's risk appetite and legal/ethical obligations. Implement a robust risk assessment framework to identify and mitigate potential issues.  

• Foster a culture of transparency and open communication where team members feel comfortable raising concerns early on. Hold regular review sessions to assess innovative projects and maintain accountability. 

• Celebrate and reward calculated risk-taking while also acknowledging and learning from failures constructively. For example, many organisations have found that despite initial challenges, strategic ALSP partnerships enabled them to access key capabilities and drive innovation. 

• Clearly communicate the importance of innovation and align innovation goals with strategic priorities. Provide training in skills like design thinking and change management to build confidence in experimenting.  

• Create dedicated time and resources for innovation activities like hackathons or research and development (R&D). Establish KPIs that incentivise innovative approaches. Share stories of innovations that emerged from initial setbacks. 

By nurturing a growth mindset, legal teams can create cultures that embrace change, learn from challenges, and continuously improve. This foundation sets the stage for leveraging technology and automation to further drive innovation and efficiency.

2. Embrace Technology and Automation

As the legal industry evolves, technology and automation play an increasingly crucial role in enabling innovation and improving service delivery. Legal leaders must navigate the ethical considerations surrounding artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning while finding the right balance between automation and human interaction. 

• Ensure AI systems are transparent, explainable, and unbiased, especially for client-facing applications. Establish clear protocols for data privacy and security.   

• Consider AI's potential workforce impact and develop transition strategies. Engage in ongoing monitoring to identify unintended consequences or ethical issues. 

• Use automation strategically for routine tasks to enable higher-value work. Implement a hybrid approach combining automation's efficiency with human personalisation.  

• Train team members to work effectively with automation while maintaining client relationships. Regularly gather client feedback on automated processes and emphasise the value of human judgment and problem-solving. 

• A centralised legal department with some embedded staff aligns with GCs' preference for a hybrid human/automated approach allowing high-touch interactions. 

By thoughtfully integrating technology and automation, legal teams can enhance efficiency, free up resources for strategic work, and deliver more value to clients. However, to fully realise the potential of these tools, it's essential to invest in the professional development of the team. 

3. Invest in Professional Development 

Continuous learning and development are critical for building an innovative legal team. By providing opportunities for growth, encouraging collaboration, and breaking down silos, legal leaders can create environments that spark creativity and drive positive change. 

• Emphasise continuous learning as a core team value and lead by example in pursuing growth. Provide varied development options like training, mentoring, and rotations to suit different learning styles. 

• Encourage individual learning goals and provide resources to achieve them. Create knowledge-sharing opportunities like lunch-and-learns or internal presentations.  

• Recognise team members who pursue development and apply new skills to drive innovation. With 99% of counsel struggling to hire lawyers with the right capabilities, upskilling current staff is critical, especially around emerging issues like AI law. 

• Foster openness and psychological safety to encourage idea-sharing. Use cross-functional teams to bring together diverse skills and perspectives.   

• Encourage shadowing across practice areas to build understanding and collaboration. Leverage tools like project management software to facilitate cross-department communication. 

• While most GCs prefer centralisation, hybrid and decentralised models are common, so breaking down silos is key for alignment. 

Investing in the growth and development of legal professionals not only enhances their individual capabilities but also contributes to the overall innovation potential of the team. With a strong foundation of talent, legal leaders can focus on implementing broader strategies to build and sustain an innovative culture. 

Overall Strategies for Building an Innovative Legal Team 

Building an innovative legal team requires a multifaceted approach that encompasses talent management, diversity and inclusion, and strategic partnerships. By implementing these overarching strategies, legal leaders can create teams that are well-equipped to tackle the challenges and opportunities of the evolving legal landscape. 

• Establish clear criteria for identifying innovative talent, like creativity and problem-solving skills. Use assessments like work samples or innovation challenges when hiring. 

• Provide opportunities to showcase innovative ideas through competitions or pitch sessions. Offer mentoring and innovation-focused career paths to attract and retain top talent. 

• Recognise diversity of thought as a driver of innovation. Implement inclusion strategies like diverse hiring, bias training, and employee resource groups.  

• Foster psychological safety and use inclusive meeting practices so all feel heard. Gather feedback on inclusion and belonging to continually improve diversity efforts.   

• Collaborate with clients, partners, and academia to identify trends and innovation opportunities. Participate in legal innovation networks and events to share best practices. 

• Partner with ALSPs and legal tech vendors to access specialised expertise and drive efficiency. Engage in joint R&D to co-create solutions for unmet needs.   

With 87% of departments facing hiring freezes, engaging external partners strategically is crucial to access necessary capabilities and innovate. Implementing these strategies creates a strong foundation for innovation, but to truly maximise the potential of their teams, legal leaders must also consider the strategic integration of alternative legal service providers (ALSPs). 

Strategic Integration of ALSPs 

ALSPs like Axiom offer legal departments a powerful avenue to drive innovation, increase agility, and access experienced legal talent. By strategically integrating ALSPs into their operations, legal teams can respond more effectively to changing client expectations and market dynamics. 

• ALSPs offer flexibility to scale resources up or down for fluctuating demands. Leveraging ALSPs for routine tasks frees up teams for strategic work aligned with shifting client needs. 

• ALSPs' global presence enables 24/7 support across time zones. Their tech and process innovation allows more efficient, data-driven solutions to stay ahead of the curve. 

• Develop a clear strategy for integrating ALSPs, establishing governance and communication frameworks for seamless collaboration. Implement secure platforms for data-sharing and project tracking.  

• Provide change management to help staff understand and leverage ALSP capabilities. Regularly assess ALSP partnerships and optimize based on data. 

• Access ALSPs' deep legal tech capabilities in AI, automation, and analytics. Gain exposure to cutting-edge tools and best practices to inform internal innovation.   

• Partner with ALSPs to cost-effectively pilot new tech solutions before scaling. ALSPs like Axiom can provide highly capable talent and tailored, tech-enabled solutions at lower costs. 

The strategic use of ALSPs allows legal departments to enhance their innovation capabilities, drive efficiency, and ultimately deliver greater value to their organisations and clients. 

Final Thoughts 

By applying these proven strategies, legal leaders can cultivate innovative cultures, leverage technology strategically, invest in continuous development, and integrate flexible ALSP partnerships to build high-performing teams equipped to thrive in an increasingly complex legal landscape. Leaders facing experience or skill gaps shouldn't hesitate to reach out to knowledgeable partners like Axiom to access the right highly capable professionals to accelerate innovation and drive better outcomes for their organisations and clients. With the right mindset, tools, talent, and partnerships, legal teams can navigate the challenges of the future and emerge as innovation leaders in their field. 

💡 Build your own innovative legal team with Axiom's high-quality talent.