Sep 26, 2020 2 min read

Fringe Legal #16: Space Exploration & XPrize / innovation spectrum / better questions

I hope you are well. I took a week off to go on a road trip, heading west from Chicago to Utah and Yellowstone National Park.

We drove over 4200 miles in under eight days. I'm energized and excited for the rest of the year.

Here are 3 things that were worth sharing.

ATTEND

Litera (full disclosure, I work at Litera) hosts the second installment of the Changing Lawyer Live conference on 1st October - this Thursday. It runs from 10am - 2.30pm Chicago / 4pm - 8.30pm UK

It is free to attend and well worth registering (even if you can't make it, register so you can get the content after the fact).

Here are three reasons why I'll be going:

There is a much-needed panel on driving diversity, equity, and inclusion in the legal profession. The panelists are a fantastic group of leaders who are in the trenches leading through this every day.
Forward thinkers talk about the future of work. Looking at the panelist list, I have high confidence that they will not hold anything back!
What does space travel and legal have in common? Watch Anousheh Ansari - first female private space explorer and CEO of XPrize - and find out. I have the distinct privilege of speaking to Anousheh for a Q&A after her keynote.

THINK

This week I'm speaking at the TechLaw.Fest on measuring innovation maturity. It was a challenging talk to prepare because there is a lot to say. There are many ways to create maturity models; describing them is challenging when you have less than 15 minutes and a broad audience.

In the end, I decided to speak broadly about 'what is innovation', 'the characteristics of innovative firms', and thinking about maturity across the 'innovation spectrum'. I hope that anyone can place themselves, their clients, their teams somewhere on the band without thinking too much with the latter. This can then be validated with data and a strategy created to tackle the move.

I would love to hear your thoughts on where you/your firm/business/team might fall on the innovation spectrum.

N.B. I chose that specific image of the spectrum because I loved the messy feeling. After all, more often than not, innovation is a messy affair (in a good way!).

WATCH

While I was traveling, my friend and colleague Michael Almeida took over Fringe Legal Edge.

Last week, he spoke with Alice Namuli Blazevic - Partner at Katende, Ssempebwa & Company Advocates & Co-Founder of The Legal Innovation Hub.

The pace of legal tech innovation and adoption is unprecedented in Africa. Alice joined Michael live from Uganda and provides a view into how firms, clients, and students are thinking about using technology within the legal profession.

You can watch the full episode here (32 minutes)

Until next time. Stay well.

Want to say 'hello'? Find me on LinkedIn.