Lawyers are trained to look to the past for solutions—and to mitigate risk. And for day-to-day work, that makes perfect sense, of course. But for mapping out the future of the legal services industry, strictly following precedence presents this problem:

You can’t move forward if you’re not looking ahead.

In other words, the roots this industry has in the past are stifling its progress. And because law, business and entrepreneurship are now converging, the legal services industry needs to now, more than ever, look to the future and anticipate coming trends to innovate alongside those entities.

How?

First of all, get outside the jar.

To push legal services forward, it’s important to look at not only the industry itself to uncover insights and trends—it’s vital to take stock of what’s happening in other parallel industries for cues and inspiration.

Take outsourcing for example. Most industries providing services are outsourcing lower-level tasks to drive down costs, and this practice can be applied (as some firms already have) to the legal services industry to allow associates and partners to better focus on larger, more complicated tasks. Or, take a look at the imminent trend of globalization: More and more companies are going global due to the connectivity the Internet affords us, and legal services will need to be prepared to go global as well. These and many other insights inspired by parallel industries can help legal professionals re-define and renovate the legal services industry.

Technology and connectivity will continue to evolve, driving the need for the legal services industry to innovate. And the leaders of that change will be leaning forward, while looking outward instead of looking back.

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