By Legal Futures Associate LEAP Enterprise [1]
It’s tempting to think digital transformation is a technology problem. A recent breakfast roundtable hosted by LEAP Enterprise [2] CEO Joe Sanderson and Head of Product James Dudden suggested otherwise. Gathering a group of law firm leaders to tackle two-pointed questions: with so many big challenges, what is the best decision-making framework, and does firm structure make a difference?
The conversation kept returning to people, process and governance rather than the tools themselves.
The session brought together law firm leaders, including Alison Broadberry (Edwin Coe LLP), Simon Mason (Elite Law Solicitors), Nav Jassal (Fox Williams), Rebecca Austin and Mel Messenger (Greenwoods Legal Services), Poonam Patel (Harbottle & Lewis), Michael McDonnell (Underwood Solicitors LLP) and Zoe Bailey (Withers & Rogers).
Decision-making is the real bottleneck
Across firms large and small, the leaders agreed that the toughest challenge is managing many fronts at once, and that the constraint is often the speed of decision-making itself. One leader noted that with 50 partners, making decisions efficiently is just as challenging as selecting the right solution. Firms that had sharpened their approach credited better data and a clear strategy that names priorities for the months ahead, particularly around technology investment.
“The firms getting this right have stopped treating technology as a series of isolated purchases and started treating it as an infrastructure decision — one owned at the top, not pushed down the org chart.” — Joe Sanderson, CEO, LEAP Enterprise
Structure shapes everything
The partnership model took centre stage. Several attendees described the tension between the need to move faster and partners’ expectations of a say in every decision. One firm’s answer — a management committee with clearer cabinet responsibility, backed by a revised management deed — had embedded faster decision-making and delivered measurable results.
The group broadly agreed that the traditional structure is increasingly strained by growth, compliance and succession pressures, and that silos are the enemy of pace.
Adoption, AI and the vendor’s role
For an IT audience, the discussion on adoption was the richest. Leaders were candid that busy people struggle to prioritise learning new tools, and shared what worked: tying adoption to bonus schemes, creating non-chargeable learning time, running pre-go-live trials that deliberately include less tech-savvy colleagues, and holding listening sessions to surface honest feedback.
Legal AI [3] drew some scrutiny. Checking output is time-consuming; clients’ own AI use can create a disconnect from a firm’s advice; and poor prompting has, in one case, caused a serious trust problem that only a structured training programme resolved. Several firms had introduced or tightened AI policies, finding that clear frameworks give people the confidence to use the technology well.
The role of the vendor came through strongly. Leaders stressed the importance of partnering with a provider who can calm nerves and offer advice well beyond go-live, with one firm reflecting that thin post-implementation support had created lasting delays it would avoid today.
“Adoption is where the value is won or lost. The best tool in the world delivers nothing if people don’t trust its output or can’t find the time to learn it — which is why post-go-live support matters as much as the technology itself.” — James Dudden, Head of Product, LEAP Enterprise
The throughline was clear: transformation succeeds or fails on structure, data, adoption and support — not on the specification of any single system.
For firms willing to get those foundations right, technology becomes a genuine enabler rather than another source of friction.