Need help understanding changes in the legal profession? ABA Center for Innovation is here for you

In March 2020, the way lawyers practiced changed. As the pandemic took hold, lawyers, like everyone else, were forced to adapt to a different reality. The rapid introduction of technology into firms and courts was a shocking pivot. Under closer examination, however, changes in technology, regulation, and innovation began well before the pandemic. The ABA Center for Innovation and our library of resources can help illuminate these changes and provide insight into the future of the legal profession.

Here is a brief overview of some of the resources and organizations you can leverage to help your members and the clients they serve.

Understanding the regulatory innovation landscape

Regulatory changes in the legal industry will have broad-ranging impacts for your members and can often be overwhelming and difficult to follow. Many members may not even know where to start gathering this information. Others may not fully understand the jargon and buzzword-filled concepts circling the conversation around regulatory changes (e.g., “sandboxes” and “alternative business structures”). The Center for Innovation’s Legal Regulatory Survey offers answers to questions your members may have.

Published in 2019 and maintained to reflect the changing landscape, this website is the only comprehensive state-by-state map of regulatory innovation happening across the country. Presented as a simple but elegant point-and-click map, this tool is available for your members and the public to see what the most recent regulatory innovation changes are in every state.  This database also includes a look at how each state differs from the ABA Model Rules of Professional Conduct. It can serve as a research tool for presenters, bar working groups and task forces, and anyone else looking to understand just what the state of play is in regulatory innovation. 

Imagining what the future can hold

The future of the legal profession will not be static; it will be dynamic and changing, and these conversations are just the beginning.

The ABA Center for Innovation, IAALS (the Institute for the Advancement of the American Legal System), the ABA Center for Professional Responsibility, the ABA Standing Committee on the Delivery of Legal Services, and Legal Hackers host a quarterly speaker series, Redesigning Legal, to provide a forum to learn about and discuss the changes underway in legal education, the judiciary, and the delivery of legal services. Industry leaders and experts offer a variety of perspectives and provide information on the nature and scope of the access to justice crisis, including sustainable access to legal services and systems.

The Center regularly gathers information about new service delivery models, court-based innovations, and other developments that positively impact how the public accesses legal services and information. Every month, the Innovation Network Podcast brings engaging presentations from change agents who are transforming the legal industry. The guests speak to both positive and negative ends of this innovative growth spectrum across the nation and worldwide.