In-house lawyers need their own space, and law firms need to change their marketing

Disruptive lawyers sounds like a contradiction in terms. However much lawyers like to think they’re a bit maverick, the legal profession is hardly full of Bash Street kids.

The Disruptive GCs group, set up by Lisa Gan Tomlins of Made.com and Matt Wilson of Uber, refers really to the companies for which they work: mostly tech and fintech. It’s the sort of environment in which the pace of technology and change in user habits is so fast that a supportive place to chat about good practice is vital.

I happened to be present at the birth of the Disruptive GCs group. Like many great ideas, it was happened upon almost by accident. It was at The Lawyer’s Hot 100 party in January. It was, you might say, at a mature point in the evening, and Lisa and Matt were sympathising with each other about the specific challenges of working for lean tech companies. Then the light dawned that others would be in the same position. Six months later, there’s an established grouping of lawyers working – broadly – in tech, swapping war stories, tips and advice.

It’s not the first group of in-house lawyers to get together. There are plenty of industry groupings, but they’re usually a little more formal, where general counsel discuss wider regulatory trends. They’re almost certainly not doing what the Disruptive GCs are starting to do, which is coming up with ideas for commercial deals – and these ideas are directly coming out of their meet-ups. In-house lawyers are obsessed with proving their value to the company; this sort of supportive and commercial environment is ideal.

What’s so cute about the Disruptive GCs group is that it’s a cross between therapy and crowdsourcing of ideas. As Lisa Gan Tomlins says, “It’s a great forum for discussing not only substantive legal issues but also getting some ideas for how to deal with practical issues that are common to many of our businesses.”

So this can include the tools they use to track competing requests for legal support, the strategies they adopt to justify growth in legal teams and budget, and last but not least, the challenges of working with entrepreneurs with a high appetite for risk.

Notably, this is not covered by most law firms within seminars. In-house lawyers are going elsewhere for this support.

And this is a subterranean shift that private practice needs to be aware of. The biggest challenge for law firms isn’t just technology, or Brexit, or rich Americans poaching partners. It’s the way that in-house lawyers are talking to one another rather than picking up the phone to their client partner.

The seminar model that most law firms rely on is helpful to a degree – certainly, after 24 June most law firms found that any Brexit briefing had in-house lawyers there in droves – but private practice can’t rely on that sort of politico-regulatory earthquake every month.

Private practice needs to tone down the broadcasting and dial up the facilitating. And in-house lawyers need to make the most of their own networks.

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