The legal profession will continue to undergo unprecedented structural and technological changes. Thus, there will be a growing demand for lawyers with the skills and ability to harness technology in the practice of law. From project management skills to modern business methods and design thinking, lawyers must adapt in order to survive the impact that the disruption of traditional legal services will have on the legal profession.
You are probably wondering where to go to gain these skills and training? Well here’s a few new innovative fellowship programs for practicing attorneys, that focus on training lawyers around the use of technology in delivering legal services.
The Evolve Law Tech Fellowship is a prestigious four-month program based in New York for in-house counsel and legal operations professionals that focus on education and implementation of specific legal technologies. The first 2017 program focuses on document automation or assembly technologies. Fellows will participate in a fast-paced accelerator-style program that includes educational content; product development and design thinking training; product demos; and hands-on implementation support. At the end of the Fellowship participants will better understand the document automation landscape, have a framework for assessing other technologies and see tangible results from a pilot project implemented during the program.
The ABA Center for Innovation recently launched their Innovation Fellows Program. Fellows take a 9-12 week sabbatical from their workplace and spend that time at the ABA headquarters in Chicago working on projects that will improve the legal sector and practice of law. The first Innovation Fellows will start in April 2017 and will attend on a rolling basis, determined by the length of their participation.
You can definitely expect more of these types of programs to crop up in the near future until there is a full revamping of our legal education model. But for now, check out these cool programs, and others to gain the skills necessary for the future of law practice.