The results from this year’s legal services consumer tracker survey make for interesting reading. In its sixth year, the research finds that a firm’s reputation continues to grow in importance, holding its top slot as the number one factor influencing choice of lawyer, with price remaining a strong second, reflected in a shift towards higher numbers of fixed-fee transactions. Alongside, it reports that trust in lawyers has declined to 42%, from 47% in 2012. It’s useful information as far as it goes, but what is the sector going to do with it?

Tech is famous for its shorter and shorter hype cycles. Robot lawyers were all over the twitters only a few months ago and now people actually yell at you for even mentioning the thing. Of course, robot lawyers should not even have surfaced in the first place because no one is remotely close to building them. Lawyers should not fear for their livelihoods. But there is something that is much more important than robot lawyers. It’s robot clients. Or at least the proliferation of machines, automated transactions, and standardized processes where lawyers once controlled the terrain.

The Legal Services Board’s vision for the future of legal regulation reflects the build-up of years of frustration. Frustration at an illogical system where anyone can write a will, administer an estate or provide employment law advice, but only lawyers can do conveyancing as it is a reserved legal activity. And the reason for that? Because in 1804 Prime Minister William Pitt the Younger wanted to raise taxes on articles of clerkship and practising fees, and offered lawyers a conveyancing monopoly as compensation.

It goes without saying that being a partner in a law firm involves plenty of hard work. The more senior your role, the more effort and time that needs to be allocated towards management and making the hard-hitting business decisions that will drive the firm’s growth. As you ascend the partnership’s management ladder, the amount of time you can spend on your regular fee-earning work is reduced substantially, taking away the pleasures of being a solicitor.

In my last post, talking about the law firm of 2020, I ended with thoughts about how firms could undertake a radical review of their processes- and decide the best/cheapest person to do parts of it. This time I want to pick up on that point and talk some more about process decomposition. So let’s look at another industry again, this time farming. It is quite similar to law in some ways – a long-established industry, mainly traditional in its approach, and not inclined to change.