Innovative Lawyers summit
Legal Leadership in the Rise of Stakeholder Capitalism
The sixth Innovative Lawyers Summit hosted by the Financial Times and RSG Consulting was a three-day festival exploring themes of speed, sustainability, trust and collaboration. The summit covered three geographical regions: Asia-Pacific, Europe and North America. While the themes were common to each region, the speakers and angles differed.
The pandemic accelerated underlying trends such as the move to digital, the need to be resilient and sustainable and the dangers of misinformation undermining trust in institutions and processes. The rise of stakeholder capitalism, which believes business should serve customers, suppliers, workers and communities as well as shareholders is both a challenge and an opportunity for the commercial legal profession. But as the chief executive becomes more politicised, the role of commercial legal leaders, who have traditionally been apolitical, becomes unclear.
Should legal leaders intervene to make a difference? And if so, what does that intervention look like? What strategies and tools are available to them to be effective as leaders in this complex environment? This virtual summit gathered law firm leaders, general counsel, academics and other business innovators, to discuss the role commercial lawyers should play in addressing some of the dilemmas facing business and society in 2021.
Trust & Transparency
A global view on how and what commercial lawyers can and should do to restore confidence in business and public institutions and their own organisations, and how the notion of the trusted adviser is evolving
ESG
Head from lawyers leading the ESG agenda on how the industry should intervene in the ESG agenda with ideas as to how they can make the most impact
Accelerating Business
How digital transformation in business is forcing the legal industry to change how it works.
Accelerating Business: Design-thinking, agile and new working methods are transforming legal practice
The Big Interviews
Scott Farrell on the need for lawyers to have a more human approach, author Matthew Syed on how to escape echo chambers and Professor Heidi Gardner on what next for collaboration in the legal industry.
The Big Issues
Debates and discussions on whether blockchain will revolutionise the practice of law; private practice lawyers will be disrupted by the ‘3rd pillar’ (law and tech companies) of the legal industry; and how to lead a law firm in a partisan world.
The Break-Out Debate: Legal practice has changed forever, but lawyers in private practice are too far behind to catch-up and will be displaced by law companies and technology. Does this statement reflect reality?
