Future of Law by Goodlawyer – Details, episodes & analysis

Lawyers continually fight against industry stigma.

Mental health pressures.

Wanting a more creative way to practice.

Spending time with family & on side businesses.

Yet the traditional legal career models struggle to sufficiently serve a large segment of lawyers and companies.

To launch Season 2, Pauline Chan, a fractional General Counsel, serial entrepreneur and Head of Lawyer Experience at Goodlawyer, takes us through her journey from walking away from BigLaw, building her own businesses and designing a legal career that fits her life’s goals.

In her ever thoughtful and passionate style, Pauline lives what it means to be a passionate advocate for lawyers. To offer them greater access to exciting career opportunities. And encourage them to bring out their diverse skills.

In this interview you’ll take away:

2:50: A shocking return to the Legal industry with Goodlawyer

6:20: Curiosity turned darkness into passion

8:10: Law in a way that works for you

14:52: Fighting off the doubt(er)s

18:30: The benefits of doing more than 1 thing

22:25: Changing mental health stigma in the law

26:45: Being the example you want to see

31:30: How to reassure yourself in scary moments

34:45: Quickly test if your interests are career options

37:15: The Future of Law looks like this

43:35: 3 rapid fire questions on designing your life & work

51:40: Your greatest asset is masquerading as a weakness

Episode Resources:

Learn more from Pauline Chan about how to design an intentional career and about fractional legal work with Goodlawyer here: ⁠www.linkedin.com/in/paulinepochan⁠ and ⁠www.goodlawyer.ca⁠.

To uncover your natural gifts and elevate your Career or your Team, connect with Chad Aboud: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠www.linkedin.com/in/chadaboud/⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ and ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠www.chadaboud.com⁠⁠

Our guest today is Andrew Goldner. Andrew is a lawyer and Co-Founder & CEO of GrowthX - a venture capital fund based out of San Francisco. 

Andrew’s resume doesn’t read like a typical VC Partner. Although Andrew started his career in New York, it wasn’t on Wall Street, nor was it in finance, or even as a startup founder.

Andrew started his journey as an internet lawyer, back when the internet was an emerging technology. Though successful by every measure, Andrew became restless after several years of practice. Specifically, he took issue with the fact that the legal profession emphasized the time spent, rather than the value added to their clients.  

After some deliberation, Andrew decided to leave the firm and embarked on an eclectic journey that took him to DoubleClick (a startup eventually acquired by Google), Thompson Reuters (where he was Managing Director of Reuter News in Singapore of all places), and he even tried his hand as a New Your City restauranteur!

Eventually, all these roads lead him to found GrowthX, a venture capital fund dedicated to helping founders find product market fit and get investment ready for their Series A. 

As you will hear, Andrew’s earned wisdom both as a lawyer and as a venture capitalist makes him an ideal guest for this show. Our conversation covers:

* Andrew’s journey from law to venture capital;

* Insights for lawyers working with startups (especially those lawyers who are risk averse);

* How the path to finding “product-market fit” is actually a formula; and

* Why “move fast and break things” is often the worst advice a founder can receive.

Whether you are a lawyer, startup general counsel, investor, or simply someone interested in learning how to grow a startup, Andrew drops plenty of “truth bombs” (a reference you will soon understand) that you won’t want to miss!

It was a pleasure having Andrew on the podcast and I hope you get as much out of this conversation as I know I did.

For more on Andrew, follow him on LinkedIn, and be sure to check out GrowthX. Links as always in the show notes. 

GrowthX Blog

Andrew Goldner LinkedIn

Want to Practice on Goodlawyer?

If you (or a lawyer you know) would like to find out more information about practicing on the Goodlawyer platform, be sure to check out goodlawyer.ca/for-lawyers for all the details.

Goodlawyer gives independent and solo lawyers from across Canada the power & resources of a firm, all while allowing you the freedom to practice the way you want.

It is tough to debate that the legal profession, as a whole, is behind the times. 

Why? 

Well...simply put, because we haven't been forced to change. 

However, those days of complacency appear to be over. 

Clients are demanding more transparency and fairness in pricing. 

Lawyers are demanding modern tools to do their job more effectively. 

And it seems that every other day you are hearing about some legal tech startup raising a big round of funding. 

But what exactly can we expect from the technological revolution that it is upon us? 

While there is no question there are advantages to be gained, there are also perils to be avoided.  

Thankfully, the future of legal tech was the topic of conversation of one of our panels at our recent Goodlawyer Summit.

Our conversation covered many points including:

* How the legal profession can maintain its humanity while still embracing technological improvements. 

* How lawyers and law firms  can harness learnings from other traditional industries that have gone through a similar technological revolutions (ex: fintech and healthtech) 

* And where the biggest hurdles lie in adopting new technology in our practices. 

If you want to catch the full experience, make sure to watch the panel on our YouTube page:

As always, thanks for tuning in!  

For those of you who regularly listen to the Future of Law podcast (and yes...there are a growing number of you), today’s show is a little different.

As many of you know, Goodlawyer recently put on our very first Summit. Over the next several weeks, we will be releasing some of the incredible conversations we were able to have right here on this  podcast.

To lead us off, I could think of no better that my good friend, and Goodlawyer's Chief Legal Officer, Josh Weinberger.

Josh began his career in Big Law, and practiced at a major firm for over 5 years before taking the entrepreneurial leap to Goodlawyer.

Many who knew Josh were, at first, surprised by his decision to leave his venerated position at his firm.

By all accounts he had it made. He was a young, respected, making Big Law money, and was on a fast tract to become a partner (the gold standard in law).

However, despite his outward professional success, Josh knew something was missing.

During the Summit, Josh told his very intimate and powerful story about why he left Big Law to risk it all on this little but fast growing startup we call Goodlawyer.

We have already heard from many of you who deeply resonated with Josh's tale, and hope by releasing it here, it will inspire even more to reflect, and ultimately pursue a life aligned with your values.

On a final note, it is rare that I encourage people NOT to to listen to the podcast, but if you have a moment, I highly encourage you to click on the YouTube link below. Josh's talk has a few visual elements that pack a punch, and trust me wether you are a law student, or firmly on track to become partner at you law firm, it is well worth the time.

I hope you all get as much of of Josh’s talk as I did. Thanks for listening!

On the show this week, we are delighted to have on Ken Murphy, the Founder and CEO of IRIS.

Ken earned his law degree from Queen’s University in 1999, but instead of pursuing the traditional path of practicing at a law firm, Ken launched his own startup...just as the dot com bubble was about to burst, which needless to say made it a very difficult time to be a founder. 

While Ken’s first start-up didn’t achieve the success he was hoping for, he was able to parlay that experience into a product development role at Thomson Reuters Canada, where he has worked in various capacities for the past 20 years.

Although achieving professional success, in 2018 the entrepreneurial bug came calling once again.  Ken combined his knowledge of product development and his interest in AI and Machine Learning to found IRIS, a company looking to revolutionize the lengthy and costly insolvency and restructuring process.

Our conversation covers many topics including:

* Why Ken chose not to pursue private practice after law school;

* The problems Ken saw in the insolvency space that inspired him to to found IRIS; and

* The future of legal tech and some of the implications this will have on future practitioners.

For more on Ken & IRIS, you can follow him on LinkedIn, or check out IRIS’ new site:

https://www.irisml.com/

https://www.linkedin.com/company/64255543/admin/

On the show this week, we are thrilled to have back on Nathan Hepple, Director at HBA Legal based in Sydney, Australia.

Our conversation covers a lot of ground including:

* The advantages of having non-lawyers own and help run law firms, and why regulations in Canada should change to allow for more choice in determining a firm structure.

* The difference between the business of law and the practice of law, and why distinguishing between the two when it comes to running the firm is critical;

* The existential risks posed to traditional law firms who continue to resist innovation;

* The importance of value based billing instead of the traditional billable hours approach; and 

* Some fantastic advice to law students.

If you want to hear more from Nathan, be sure to check out his podcast "Pardon My Objection”, where he, alongside one of our previous guests Mitch Kowalski, challenge many of the accepted traditions in the legal profession. 

https://www.linkedin.com/in/nathan-hepple-6b558751/

On the show today we are happy to welcome back Ian Holloway, Dean of Law at the University of Calgary where he led the implementation of the Calgary Curriculum, which offers a more hands-on approach to legal education than you typically find at most law schools around the country.

Our discussion covers many topics including:

* The history of our current model of legal education;

* The importance of young lawyers receiving hands on mentorship from their more senior counterparts; and

* The cost of legal education and whether or not the high price is necessarily a bad thing.

If you want to hear more from Dean Holloway, you can follow him on twitter (@LawDeanHolloway) or sign up today for the Goodlawyer Summit taking place on November 3rd & 4th where Dean Holloway will be one of our many esteemed speakers taking the stage. 

The Goodlawyer Summit is a hybrid virtual and in-person event that will empower entrepreneurs and startups to level up their businesses, while bringing together some of the brightest minds in law to reimagine a future where legal work is seen as a catalyst and not an obstacle. Make sure you reserve your free (but limited) tickets today!

https://www.goodlawyer.ca/summit/future-of-law

@LawDeanHolloway

We are joined by Dr. Gideon Christian, a lawyer and an assistant professor at the University of Calgary faculty of law. Gideon specializes in legal technology, specifically electronic discovery, artificial intelligence & law, and the environmental impacts of technology.   

Our discussion covers:

* How technology will impact the practice of law in the coming years. 

* Why the legal profession has historically been resistant to adopting and using innovative technology.

* How law schools need to better expose and train the new generation of lawyers to use the legal tech available to them; and

* Why embracing innovation in law is critical to solving the access to justice crisis that affects not only Canada, but many jurisdictions around the world.  

If you want to hear more from Gideon, you can follow him on twitter or linkedin (links in the show notes) or better yet, sign up for the Goodlawyer Summit taking place on November 3rd & 4th where Gideon will be gracing the stage as a member of our legal tech panel.  

@ProfXtian

@UCalgaryLaw

  https://www.linkedin.com/in/gideon-christian-phd-477a889a/

The Goodlawyer Summit is a hybrid virtual and in-person event that will empower entrepreneurs and startups to level up their businesses, while bringing together some of the brightest minds in law to reimagine a future where legal work is seen as a catalyst and not an obstacle. 

It is shaping up to be an amazing event, so make sure you reserve your free (but limited) tickets today!

https://www.goodlawyer.ca/summit/future-of-law

https://www.goodlawyer.ca/summit/build-for-good

Our guest tonight is Pauline Chan, an entrepreneur and one of our very own Goodlawyers who possesses over a decade of legal experience helping businesses of all sizes get the help they need. 

Our discussion with Pauline covers much of  the lawyer’s journey, including: 

* Her experience in law school; 

* Being recruited by one of the top firms in the country, and 

* What ultimately led her to walk away from Big Law to set up her own private practice and open a barre fitness studio.  

For any of you law students going through on campus interviews at the moment, we hope this episode will give you a different perspective as you make your decisions on where you will article.

https://www.goodlawyer.ca/summit/future-of-law

Today's guest is Ryan Clements, a lawyer, entrepreneur, author and Assistant Professor at the University of Calgary faculty of law. Ryan received his LLB (with distinction) from the University of Alberta, as well as his Master of Laws, and Doctorate of Juridical Science from Duke University Law School.

In our conversation we cover: 

* What attracted Ryan to law in the first place, and what influenced his trajectory from Big Firm lawyer, to entrepreneur, and now into to academia;

* How a law degree is like a owning a swiss army knife that can be used in numerous settings both within and outside of a law firm setting; 

* Why it is critical to become an expert in your chosen area to achieve professional success; and

* Ryan also gives a fantastic blueprint for law students and young lawyers who are trying to sort out their career path that I wish I had when I was going through law school. 

If you want to hear more from Ryan, make sure you follow him on Twitter or connect with him on LinkedIn. 

@ryanjclements (twitter)

https://www.linkedin.com/in/ryanjclements/ (LinkedIn)

Goodlawyer Summit

Be sure to sign up for the Goodlawyer Summit taking place on November 3rd & 4th where Ryan will be gracing the stage as a member of our legal tech panel.  

The Goodlawyer Summit is a hybrid virtual and in-person event that will empower entrepreneurs and startups to level up their businesses, while bringing together some of the brightest minds in law to reimagine a future where legal work is seen as a catalyst and not an obstacle. 

Make sure you reserve your free (but limited) tickets today!

https://www.goodlawyer.ca/summit/future-of-law