Been a big few weeks one way or another for exposure to innovation.

In late September in Melbourne we hosted the ALPMA 2011 Summit the theme being “adapt innovate inspire“. We heard from a number of speakers on what this means to them, how this applies to some firms and how some of it could possibly apply to your firm.

It was great to hear from the likes of Patty Keegan, on just how social media has transformed and will continue to transform the way most of us do business and network; John Petty on why quarterly rolling financial forecasting is so much more effective for firms than the old monthly/annual budget scenario; Bruce Ross’s problem and opportunity trees; and Dr Ken Hudson had us all in the speed thinking zone. Not to forget John Dee the founder of Planet Ark and Director of Do Something reminding us all what we can and what we must do to save this planet of ours.

Then last Friday, my wife Karen & I attended for the first time a TEDx event in Melbourne. We have, as I assume many of you have, long been watchers of TED videos (if you are not, can I strongly recommend you subscribe now and watch at your leisure short videos of inspirational and riveting talks by remarkable people free) but this is the first time we had attended a TEDx speaking event live. Again the theme was innovation. It surpassed our expectations with some wonderful “home grown” speakers each of whom are innovators in their own right.

Here is a link to yet another thought provoking and challenging article from Professor Richard Susskind ( who gave us “The End of Lawyers?: rethinking the nature of legal services”) once again predicting enormous changes in the profession and our relationship with our clients over the next 5 years or so

susskind 5 years until legal market faces endgame

Although Professor Susskind focusses on the greater use of technology and outsourcing of some legal services it is difficult if not impossible to outsource judgement calls which ought to be the real value lawyers provide to our clients. However to a large degree as a profession we only have ourselves to blame if we have become too reliant on focussing on- and charging for- many of those services Susskind refers to. His comments though that ” …agents of change may not be the lawyers” should still be particularly worrying.

The general theme of constant change and yet more and more disruptors to the market is consistent with numerous posts from many other commentators and observers- a couple of which are also linked below

kowalski-the clock is ticking in five years traditional law firms maybe extinct 

Melbourne in September; ALPMA Summit 2011

I am unashamedly promoting this years ALPMA Summit being held at Crown Conference Centre in Melbourne on 16-17 September and I should also disclose my interest being on the Summit organising committee.

Notwithstanding my involvement, ALPMA has put together a terrific line up and year after year it seems to get better and better. As the only non profit organisation in Australia foundered and tailored specifically for law firm management if you are in any way involved in law firm management and you only go to one Conference this year can I strongly suggest this is the one to get to.

Apart from experiencing spring and AFL finals fever in Melbourne in the splendour of Crown, in order to live up to our title “adapt innovate inspire” after consulting with and surveying over 1000 people in law we think we have come up with some exceptionally relevant topics that any law firm would be interested in. We then set about finding some of the best and most thought provoking speakers we could find to challenge and inspire attendees led by Chrissie Lightfoot from the UK, CEO of Entrepreneur Lawyer and author of “The Naked Lawyer”. In addition to the program we also have the biggest display of sponsors who support the legal profession in attendance displaying their innovative products and services.