News Tag: Legal Innovation

March 19, 2020

Make Law Better by Looking Outside of Law—A Tax and Accounting Tutorial

When I started down the road on my 2020 Resolution for the Legal Profession to look at how we can learn from our counterparts in other professions and industries to make law better, it never occurred to me that we’d be facing a situation like the one brought on in recent weeks by the coronavirus. But as our legal community and justice system continue to respond in earnest to the challenges and disruption caused by this crisis, the importance of this undertaking has become even clearer. And the next stop on this journey—the tax and accounting profession and related businesses—offers some particularly useful lessons for our present and future times in law on the key issues of remote services and remote access.

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March 18, 2020

CBA/CBF Task Force Making Good Progress

Late last month, the full CBA/CBF Task Force on the Sustainable Practice of Law & Innovation reconvened for the first time since the Task Force launched in October 2019. The group came together this time to learn from the efforts of our Canadian colleagues, to hear updates from all five committees, and to discuss and […]

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February 13, 2020

Make Law Better by Looking Outside of Law—A Medical and Dental Examination

A trip to the doctor or dentist is not something most of us look forward to. But there is much we in law can learn from the evolution of those professions, and that is the next stop in my 2020 Resolution for the Legal Profession journey.

While there is still room for further progress, three ways these professions have improved access include: a continuum of care options with many different entry points, a range of professionals who assist and are known by who they are rather than being called “non-doctors” or “non-dentists,” and a variety of business models for their practices to best meet the needs of both the professionals and their patients.

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February 11, 2020

JEPY Awards Celebrate Innovation

Stars of the CBF Justice Entrepreneurs Project, friends, supporters and community partners gathered February 10th at Lagunitas Taproom & Brewery to celebrate innovative practices, expanded access to legal services, and lawyering with panache. The 4th Annual JEPY Awards, created by former JEP Director Trevor Clarke, honored the great work JEP attorneys are doing, recognizing attorneys […]

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December 16, 2019

2020 Resolution—Make Law Better by Looking Outside Law

By Bob Glaves | CBF Executive Director

One of the common traits of our legal profession is to view ourselves as unique in the world. And that is certainly true to an extent, as the practice of law involves specialized expertise and services that good lawyers are distinctively able to provide.

But we are […]

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November 12, 2019

New CBA/CBF Task Force Aims to Lead Our Profession into the Future

The CBA and CBF earlier this month launched a new Task Force on the Sustainable Practice of Law & Innovation with the interconnected goals of making legal services more affordable and accessible for the public and making the practice of law more innovative and sustainable for lawyers. Building on the CBA and CBF’s prior leadership on these issues and similar efforts in other jurisdictions, the Task Force will reimagine the way we regulate the business of law in Illinois and ultimately make recommendations to the Illinois Supreme Court to modernize the Rules of Professional Conduct to advance these goals. Learn more…

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October 8, 2019

CBA and CBF Aiming for Significant Legal Regulatory Reform with Creation of New Joint Task Force

The Chicago Bar Association and the Chicago Bar Foundation have announced the creation of a first-of-its-kind Illinois task force that will work to identify regulatory reform recommendations to provide enhanced access and more affordable legal services to the public, while also working to make the practice of law more innovative and sustainable for lawyers.

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June 26, 2019

New Incubator Launches in Colorado with Helping Hand from the CBF

Earlier this month, the CBF and our Justice Entrepreneurs Project (JEP) gained a new partner in the cause with the official launch of the Legal Entrepreneurs for Justice (LEJ) incubator in Denver.

Over the years since the CBF developed and launched the JEP, one of our goals for the program has been to identify successful […]

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March 27, 2019

Uber, Taxis and the Legal Market

Take a trip down bad memory lane to about ten years ago when you needed to get a cab but were not in a place where taxis tend to be plentiful on the street. Remember what that was like?

Hold that thought for a moment, and now think of what it is like today for someone who is looking for a lawyer and doesn’t know where to turn. While it is sure to get most lawyers upset to be compared to the taxi industry, the similarities in these two market failures are striking. We can write a different script for what happens in the legal market but need to start now.

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February 27, 2019

What Are We Selling?

It seems a simple question to ask, but one we do not think enough about in law and too often answer incorrectly. Getting that answer right is the first essential step towards carrying out my New
Year’s Resolution for 2019 for the legal profession to tackle our affordability problem for everyday people.

Two recent commentaries in the New York Times and the Atlantic challenge us to re-examine our profession’s longstanding assumptions on this question, and offer a good jumping off point for discussion.

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