TLH Ep.53 The Law Firm Model Is Changing-Here’s What Comes Next
Hello, Legal Helm listeners.
Today’s episode explores a question that is becoming increasingly important across the legal industry: how will AI, technology, and changing client expectations reshape the future of legal services?
We’re pleased to welcome Bjarne Tellmann, an internationally recognized legal and business leader, speaker, and author whose work sits at the intersection of legal services, technology-enabled transformation, and leadership.
Bjarne is the CEO of Fjord Stream Advisors, a visiting clinical lecturer in law at Yale Law School, and a visiting senior fellow at the London School of Economics. Over three decades in the profession, he has held senior legal and leadership roles at organizations including Haleon, GSK, Pearson, Coca-Cola, Aramco, and Kimberly-Clark, as well as practicing at Sullivan & Cromwell and White & Case.
He is also the author of Building an Outstanding Legal Team, and his forthcoming book, Law in the Era of AI: Clients, Firms, and the Future of the Legal Industry, explores how corporate legal departments could drive the next wave of disruption to the traditional law firm model.
In this episode, we’ll discuss the changing role of in-house legal teams, the impact of AI on legal services, and what the future could look like for law firms and their clients.
Stay tuned for an insightful conversation on the forces reshaping the legal industry.
Your host
Bim Dave is Helm360’s CEO. With 20+ years in the legal industry, his keen understanding of how law firms and lawyers use technology has propelled Helm360 to the industry’s forefront. A technical expert with a penchant for developing solutions that improve business systems and user experience, Bim has a knack for bringing high quality IT architects and developers together to create innovative, useable solutions to the legal arena.
Today’s Guest
Bjarne P. Tellmann is an internationally recognised legal and business leader, speaker, and author whose work focuses on the future of legal services, technology-enabled transformation, and leadership. His forthcoming book, *Law in the Era of AI: Clients, Firms, and the Future of the Legal Industry* (Wiley, 2026), examines how corporate clients will reshape legal-service delivery from the outside in. Bjarne is CEO of FjordStream Advisors, which advises legal leaders and law firms on strategy, transformation, and leadership. He is also a Visiting Clinical Lecturer in Law at Yale Law School and a Visiting Senior Fellow at the London School of Economics.
Transcript:
Bim Dave: I’m your host, Bim Dave, CEO of Helm 360. Today I’m joined by Bjarne Tellmann, an internationally recognized legal and business leader, speaker, and author whose work sits at the intersection of legal services, technology-enabled transformation, and leadership. Bjarne is also CEO of Fjord Stream Advisors, a visiting clinical lecturer at law– in law at Yale’s Law School, and a visiting senior fellow at the London School of Economics.
Across three decades in the profession, he has served as founding general counsel and a member of the executive committee at Haleon, held senior roles at GSK, Pearson, Coca-Cola, Aramco, and Kimberly-Clark, and also worked in private practice at Sullivan & Cromwell and White & Case. He is also the author of “Building an Outstanding Legal Team,” and his forthcoming book, “Law in the Era of AI: Clients, Firms, and the Future of the Legal Industry,” argues that corporate legal departments will drive the next wave of disruption to the traditional law firm model.
Bjarne, welcome to The Legal Helm.
Bjarne Tellmann: Hey, well, thanks so much for having me. It’s great to be here.
Bim Dave: So you’ve experienced the legal industry from both private practice, global businesses, academia, and now advisory work. What drew you into the law in the first place, and which moments do you think most shaped you as the leader that you have become?
Bjarne Tellmann: Wow. Um, I’d have to go back many, many years. Um, I, I, I think, um, I was searching in the ’90s for what I wanted to do. Um, I was drawn to political science, um, government, geopolitics, uh, and acting and art. Um, I was in a conservatory program for, uh, theater, uh, and, um, sort of stumbled from one thing to the next and ended up in the law just almost, almost coincidentally.
Uh, and that’s where I just discovered this confluence of ideas, um, uh, incentives, structures, all kind of coming together in a just a fantastic, uh, array of, um, disciplines. And I think that’s what really drew me to the law.
Bim Dave: Amazing. I, I did not know about the, the acting part. Um, so that, that’s, that’s really interesting. You’ve worked across like many different, uh, global organizations. What have those experiences taught you about the relationship between the legal function and the wider business?
Bjarne Tellmann: Um, you know, I think the main, uh, the main thing it’s taught me is all change really that reverberates throughout the legal industry emanates ultimately from, uh, the corporate client, um, because corporations really drive much of the spend that happens in legal. Um, and so their priorities, um, what they’re responding to in the broader environments that they’re operating in really is, um, kind of the key driver for, for both what happens with in-house lawyers and also what happens, um, by extension with law firms.
So if you wanna know where, uh, the law is heading, uh, what is incentivizing and driving lawyers today, uh, and what has in fact driven lawyers in the past, you really need to start by looking at what’s going on inside the client. Um, and to understand what’s happening in the client, you need to step back and look at the broader geopolitical and macroeconomic environments in which they’re operating.
And so as part of the, um, the book that I, that I just wrote, “Law in the Era of AI”, I – one of the most enjoyable parts of it was that I, I sort of took a long view and looked at, um, the interrelationship between the corporate client, the in-house world, and the law firm world, going back to the Gilded Age, uh, and then sort of working my way through the various eras, uh, World War II, the immediate post, uh, war globalization era, uh, the era of, uh, let’s say, the high point of modern globalization, uh, the fourth industrial revolution, and now the AI revolution.
And in each of those eras, what you see is companies flexing to adapt to the broader environment they’re operating in, having knock-on effects in terms of the, the power relationship between in-house and outside, uh, lawyers and sort of how they operate, how they’re organized, um, w-what they need to set themselves up to do.
So to me, that’s the most fascinating thing, is sort of all of this really comes from the client. And having spent, you know, many decades inside clients, um, I certainly have found that to be the case as well, just as a, as a general counsel.
Bim Dave: Hmm. Yeah, no, that’s, that’s, that’s really interesting. So, so when, when you became, um, founding general counsel at Haleon, what did building a legal function at scale reveal about designing for the future rather than inheriting the past?
Bjarne Tellmann: I think, you know, uh, i-i-in many ways it’s, it’s not that different from what I saw at Pearson, what I saw at Coca-Cola. Um, uh, it, it really all begins with sort of what are the needs of the client. Uh, the thing that changed while I was at Haleon was that AI sort of came on the scene in late 2022 when ChatGPT emerged.
And these were the early days, but what I began to see were pilots, um, across the enterprise. And those pilots suggested to me that everything was about to change. The speed at which,
Um, services can get delivered, uh, the needs of clients, the governance challenges that the business will experience, that your own operation will experience just expand exponentially.
And if you stand still and you just use old school tools and you cut heads and you try and streamline your service delivery model, you’re just not gonna keep pace with where the business is going because, uh, you know, two years ago, three years ago, a marketing team might have given you five or six versions of an ad campaign, and you’d have a week to complete that.
Today, you might get 450 versions, and you have 24 hours, right? And so it’s just not going to help to throw more bodies at it and, and try and sort of, you know, plead for a little more time. It’s coming at you from all angles. Um, so that was, you know, I think that was the signal to me that things are really changing.
And, um, data, the speed of data, the impact that getting it wrong can have in terms of machine speed and scale across the enterprise are the kinds of things that I think should be keeping general counsel awake, uh, at night these days
Bim Dave: Hmm. Yeah. No, ab-absolutely. So, so in, in your book, um, where you talk about, um, the argument that corporate legal departments will ultimately drive, uh, some of the innovation and the next wave of disruption, um, to traditional law firms, what is the role of, uh, technology vendors in that, in that kind of setup in terms of how you see the future?
Bjarne Tellmann: Well, so if you step back and you kind of look at what’s going on, I mean, you basically have
About $2.6 trillion being spent by corporations this year on AI. Um, 725 billion being spent by the hyperscalers alone. Um, that 725, by the way, is about four times Russia’s defense budget. Um, uh, it’s, it’s more than, uh…
So, it’s approximately the same as what NATO, um, European NATO allies spend, uh, a year on defense. So we’re talking about not insignificant sums of money that are streaming in. Um, this morning in The Wall Street Journal, I think there was an interesting article on the cover that some of the expenditures of, let’s say, the nine, uh, biggest tech companies may be understated by a factor of about $3 trillion, uh, in additional spend that is not yet on their balance sheets.
So, we’re not talking about small sums of money that are going in, uh, for a tech upgrade. We’re really talking about something that, uh, at that scale, you’re ooking at about 2% of US GDP being spent on AI and AI-related services. That’s 10 times what was spent on the Apollo, uh, mission to the Moon. Uh, it’s more than was spent in the 1850s on railroads.
So, we’re talking about a, uh, something a-akin to an industrial revolution. Um, I think that’s important for people to, to take into account if you then say, “Well, where is that, where is that leading inside a company? What is that money being spent on? What does an AI-enabled company look like at the end state?”
Uh, and we do have some signals of where that’s heading.
Um, Marco Iansiti and Karim Lakhani, who are two business school professors at Harvard, uh, have termed this the AI factory, and I think it’s a pretty good, um, description. I wouldn’t say it’s an analogy. I think it’s a, it’s an actually a, a description of what these AI-enabled companies have at the heart of their operating models.
They have a, an intake, uh, of data that is continuous. That intake is sorting, organizing, uh, and preparing data in ways that allow it to be read by algorithms, by agentic AI tools that then generate, uh, recommendations and actually take, increasingly take actions themselves, which result in business outcomes.
And all the while, that is generating new forms of data that get fed back into that engine, which continuously improves the model, right? Every Tesla on the road learns from every other Tesla on the road instantly, right? And the business gets better just by operating.
So, that’s what’s happening inside the company.
And then if you look at how does a legal department, uh, that sits inside one of those companies need to set itself up, effectively what you need is a miniaturized version of that AI factory. You need a tech platform at the base Uh, that, uh, generates, uh, the same kinds of, um, capabilities in terms of both advice and insights that then empowers and enables the team.
Uh, the operations of that team then result in new forms of data that get fed back, back in so that, uh, that operation continuously improves. And we see this happening, um, in some companies already. Uh, in fact, we have for quite a few years. A-and you have examples of how these legal departments can scale at very low cost, uh, and improve their output, uh, how they can, uh, expand their data sets to include enterprise data, which generates new forms of insights and learnings, and how they can continuously adapt their tools.
So, contract, uh, systems that self-adjust to the most optimal clauses based on the last 10 deals, fraud, uh, tools that self-adapt to the latest, uh, cyberattacks, et cetera, and scams. So it’s, um, it’s kind of a fascinating world that we’re heading into, and all of this is happening at a speed that is, I think, sometimes difficult for human brains to comprehend because we tend to think linearly, and yet we now live in exponential times.
So, you end up with, um, these systems aggregating their capabilities at a speed and scale that is very difficult for us to really comprehend, and the Earth kind of moves under us without our ability to forecast what that means in two years’ time, three years’ time. So you put all of that together, and I think there’s an easy kind of next logical question, which is, well, what about law firms, right?
How are law firms going to adapt to this world? Um, and, you know, I, I worry, um, and I find it both fascinating and worrying. Um, I, I’m,
I’m, I’m an avid reader of Clayton Christensen’s work, “The Innovator’s Dilemma,” uh, which, uh, you know, and, and some of his other work, which really focuses on what happens to dominant companies, incumbents, as it were, uh, in one generation of technology when the tech changes, when the landscape changes.
They tend to fail, um, and they fail because they’re so perfectly adapted to the current era, and that’s where they make their money, and that’s how they make their money. And so disrupting that engine to flex into new need states that clients have, um, new technology that is available is exceedingly difficult.
Um, almost no company, uh, has been able to do that, um, in any industry, uh, as those industries change. So that’s, you know, I think a, a really solid question is sort of what will an industry that is at record profitability today, which by the way makes it just that much harder to, to flex, right? Uh, and, and is– and that profit engine is predicated on a model that was built in the early 1900s, um, uh, that is based on leveraging the scale of human input at the l- lower levels of the, of the pyramid.
How is that model going to satisfy the needs of AI factory-enabled corporate clients that are moving at the speed and scale, uh, of technology? And we haven’t even started talking about agentic systems yet, but they’re moving at a speed that is four times that of Moore’s Law. So, uh, you know, these systems will soon be taking actions autonomously, um, at basically every, every angle inside a company, including legal.
So that kind of raises big questions around that model and how are you going to sell hourly input costs, um, particularly at the lower levels.
Bim Dave: Mm. Yeah. No, ab-absolutely. I mean, it-it’s, it’s such a fascinating time with, um, the advancements that are happening at the moment. Um, but you, you quite rightly take it to, um, the kind of next area of focus that I wanted to have, which is how legal work and value particularly changes, right?
Because as AI changes how work is produced, where will clients believe lawyers’ distinctive value truly lies?
Bjarne Tellmann: Yeah. I mean, I think it’s a, I, I think it’s a good, uh, it’s, it’s a good question. And, um, I think the, you know, I think the answer is probably one that is similar to what we’ve seen, you know, up, up until now. The true value that I think most clients are happy to pay for lies in the exercise of judgment.
Um, and I, I might even say– I mean, if you say judgment is the application of expertise based on experience, uh, and the context, uh, but I might even say wisdom, you know, not just judgment, but not just, you know, how can I do this, but should I do it?
Um, the-these are things that I think clients are absolutely prepared to pay for and will continue, I think, for, for many years to be, uh, prepared to pay for. I don’t believe that we’re entering a world where boards and CEOs are going to be comfortable relying on an AI output for how to deal with an activist investor or a takeover attempt or a major litigation, right?
So these things will be, uh, will be where the value lies both in-house and for firms But I do think that that raises a lot of questions around sort of how the current model is structured, because the, the sort of flip side of that is they won’t be prepared to pay for the engine, the current profit engine, which is, you know, lower to mid-level, uh, input costs, right?
Uh, preparing documents, uh, generating memos, you know, all the things that, that are formative in the development of wisdom, experience, et cetera.
Um, what we were all trained on back in the day, right? Sitting in those windowless due dil- diligence rooms somewhere, uh, reviewing thousands of documents and generating, you know, first version memos and, and briefs and so forth
If that all goes away, um, it has profound implications for how that gets formed and developed in young professionals. Um, it has profound implications for the intake systems of legal organizations, and we could talk about that. I think the shape and structure and strategic operating models of law firms will change and shift radically in relation to that because you will have to flex the model to adapt to what people are prepared to pay for.
Um, it has profound implications for legal education, um, and there’s a whole avenue we could discuss there around the bargain that was struck in the early 1900s between law schools and law firms in terms of what schools would teach and what firms would teach. That’s all coming undone. And so, um, you know, I think this has profound implications, and it’s coming at us with a speed that I think most people, as I said before, aren’t, uh, aren’t realizing.
Bim Dave: Yeah. See, you make a really good point about that traditional talent pyramid, right? Um, that, that we’ve seen be very effective in, in a law firm in terms of, um, you know, learning the groundwork of, of how to, how to practice, right? And, and also learning from, um, senior lawyers as to how to interact, how to communicate, all of those aspects of, of, of what a lawyer does.
So do you have a view in terms of how that talent pyra- pyramid evolves in future so that there’s still a path to partnership, uh, in, in a firm, um, for, for somebody joining from university that’s maybe slightly differently educated in the– Yes, the, the foundation is still the law, but, but fundamentally fused with some aspect of AI and technology.
Um, so more of the kind of robo lawyer, as it were, as, as, as I’ve heard that term, term being used. Um, but what, what are your thoughts on that in terms of that talent pyramid in particular?
Bjarne Tellmann: Yeah. I mean, look, I think, um, uh, I think if you, if you– again, if you start from what clients need, uh, a-a-and where the demand will come from, I think what you’re seeing is that clients are sourcing from an increasingly expanding ecosystem of providers, right? Uh, they’re no longer just looking, uh, uh, to law firms.
Uh, they still are very much looking at law firms as one source of supply and a, and a main source in many cases. But they’re also looking at alternative ex– uh, suppliers. They’re looking at tech companies, um, who can help them capture workflows, um, harness and organize the data, um, and the interfaces that are necessary for those systems to operate at scale.
Um, they are looking at capital-backed models, right, that are combining professional expertise with tech and, and, and capital, uh, inside the company more broadly, and thinking about how they can harness those systems for the legal department. All of that means they’re gonna be looking, I think, for, uh, a variety of experts, uh, that can support them.
Legal experts, technology experts, people with systems thinking, with design thinking skills, project management skills, people who understand both tech and law will be in great demand. Um, so I think that’s one interesting thing is the clients will be looking, uh, to that. And then if you think about what they’re gonna be needing from their law firms in particular, um, I don’t think you’re going to see one model survive.
I think what you’re gonna see is a whole slew of models. Um, one model that probably will survive is we, you know, we talked about wisdom and judgment.
I think boutiques, um, you know, models that basically invert the pyramid so that instead of having a very small, uh, tip at the top of equity partners and a broad base of junior associates, you might have a very broad base of equity partners and a very narrow base of junior associates with much of the work then being outsourced to technology, right?
That, that sort of boutique model could very much, I think, thrive in the, in the sort of the new era that’s coming. I think you might see hybrids emerging, so models that maybe mimic what the Big Four do. Um, so full service law, but then plus, uh, technology consulting, risk advisory, um, you know, a whole range of other capabilities and skills that clients will need.
Uh, including, by the way, how to build my own tech stack. I don’t really know how to do that. I’ve, I’ve never been trained to do that, so I need help with that. Uh, you might have capital consolidators, so these might be, uh, companies that are PE-backed, um, perhaps platforms, uh, that, uh, suck out, uh, much of the commoditized legal work inside firms and potentially also inside clients and provide that at scale, uh, using technology efficiently.
And then you might have a number of corporate models that might emerge, um, uh, sort of mimicking what Goldman Sachs did back in the late ’90s, uh, when they went public or, uh, what Keystone has done in the UK. Um, uh, you know, uh, really, uh, firms that potentially go public and draw capital in those ways and reimagine pricing, reimagine service delivery models, uh, in, in– for the, for the era that we’re entering into.
So all of that, um, I think then sort of raises the question, well, what does the operating model for all of these structures look like? Um, I think that has yet to be determined. Uh, you can sort of picture a range of shapes You know, if the current shape is a pyramid, uh, you might imagine obelisks, right?
Sort of a narrower, uh, uh, funnel of lawyers at different levels of seniority, uh, but tilted towards senior. The inverted pyramid we talked about. Diamond shapes, where you might have, you know, a bulge of mid, mid– sort of mid-level, uh, associates, uh, with a smaller base of juniors. You might have an hourglass, a flip side of that, right, where you have a broader base of juniors and, and a narrower base of, uh, mid-levels.
Uh, and there are a million others. Um, and really which shapes will survive and thrive for which model, I think, has yet to be determined by the market, and we’ll see that in the coming, uh, several years, I imagine. But all of this means both a threat and an opportunity to people entering the market. I think that, you know, what I tell my students is
if you want the career that your grandmother had, uh, with a corner office and sort of a lifetime, uh, of, uh, of partner work and, and a gold watch at
65, then I think you’re setting yourself up for potentially being very disappointed.
Um, however, if you are excited at the prospect of, um, providing greater access to, uh, to consumers of legal services, uh, thinking about delivering these services in a new, perhaps more profitable way than has ever been the case, um, reimagining how services get delivered, leveraging technologies, then I can’t imagine a better time to be in the market.
I actually find myself very envious of my students because I’m on the other end of the age spectrum and, you know, I, I can’t be part of that wave, but it’s going to be, uh, I think it’s going to be a thrilling ride over the next 20 years, uh, in the law. I don’t think the law disappears. I think it will absolutely reshape itself in very fundamental ways.
Uh, but, but those kinds of reshapings are always opportunities as much as they are threats.
Bim Dave: much as they are threats. Hmm. Yeah, no, a-absolutely. It’s defin-definitely an exciting time. So, so I wanna go back to, um, pricing for a moment and just kind of discuss that a little bit further because one of the things that we’ve seen happen over the last couple years in particular is we kinda went through that period where lots of firms were experimenting, um, doing lots of POCs, spending quite a lot of money, um, investing in various AI solutions because the, the idea being that one, one solution does not solve all problems, right?
Um, so there was multiple, um, new startups that came to market. Some of them didn’t last very long, some of them are still there today. Um, so there’s, there’s a lot of experimentation that then turned into, okay, we’ve got a few solutions actually where we can see that the needle is moving and we can, we can save, um, time, we can be more efficient, we can do more, um, uh, do more with less, um, what- whatever the, whatever the, the value it brings.
Now, the, the challenge that I see now and are really interested to get your thoughts on this is, is then how firstly does that then translate into, um, a pricing model that makes sense? Like there’s, there’s been talk about outcome-based models and subscriptions and charging a technology fee, for example.
Um, are you– How, how are you advising firms to be thinking about that, given that you may have like multiple, um, systems in place, there’s often a usage fee tied to those as well, um, and tracking and coordinating which, uh, which of those, uh, fees apply to the work that you’re doing for a particular firm may be, may be challenging, right?
Um, so really interested to get your take in terms of how, how you’re advising firms and, and how we should be thinking about that.
Bjarne Tellmann: So I think it very much depends on what services the firm is providing, first of all. Um, uh, you know, pricing based on the value of the output, uh, is something that, let’s say many elite firms that engage in very high-level transactional work e-effectively already do. I, I think in many cases, while they have an hourly rate and, uh, you know, the number of times that they actually charge clients, um, the, the sort of the, the rack rate is, uh, is very, very low.
And really what happens is a number gets written on a napkin at the end of a meal, uh, and that that’s sort of those– you know, maybe there’s a success fee tied to it. Uh, or in some cases, uh, you know, there are some firms that, um, already just charge a percentage of the value, uh, of the transaction. Um, so that exists, and I think that, you know, the boutique models will, uh, will, be able to, uh, adapt fairly, uh, quickly to that.
I think for many other firms, it’s a big challenge. Um, uh, firms that, you know, let’s say aren’t evolved towards that boutique model or that still rely very heavily on, uh, a large base of juniors as the predicate engine for their profit model, it’s not just a question of figuring out how to charge differently, it’s a question of what do you do with the structure you have.
Um, how do you reorganize your entire organizational structure to accommodate, uh, you know, y- uh, the, the new needs? And in a way, what you’re asking these firms to do is rebuild their plane mid-flight, um, which is nearly impossible, right? And, and then you also look at the fact that inside these firms, if you try to change the pricing models, uh, who is the decision maker?
It’s going to be equity partners sitting at the very top who are at peak earning years, who probably have another five years to go. Um, a-and you know, what partner is gonna raise their hand and say, “Hey, I have a suggestion. You know, let’s, let’s take 30 or 40% of the money we otherwise would be giving ourselves, um, and let’s invest it in some disruptive new pricing model that will take 10 years, um, uh, to come to fruition,” right?
It’s just not gonna happen in what is effectively a coalition of the willing. Um, partners can leave, and they can take their clients with them, right? So you have these structural, um, these structural impediments that make it extremely hard to change inside a firm. What I, um, often advise firms in that situation is
To really think in a much smaller and less threatening way.
Um, maybe start a little side hustle, right? Invest a small amount of money in, uh, in an engine outside the firm that is autonomous, uh, that has its own leadership, and that is tasked with, uh, disrupting the firm itself.
Um, uh, this is, uh, what, uh, you know, Michael Gerson sang at Cleary Gottlieb did a few years back, and, uh, when he created, uh, Cleary X, the mission statement that he put out there for Cleary X was create the firm that will disrupt Cleary.
Um, that was a very interesting mission statement. I think what you– what happens when you do that is, A, it’s not threatening to the, the current body, right? Y- it’s not, you’re not gonna trigger the internal corporate partner, partnership immune system that will expel any threat to the existing model. And B, it gives you an opportun- opportunity to learn, um, by targeting different parts of the market, by having absolute freedom to set up a new structure, by thinking about how you can leverage technology and pricing in innovative ways that deliver value to clients who themselves are changing.
I think that’s a much more useful way to think about this than to come with some fully baked, rigid idea of what is going to work in your situation. Um, just experiment and learn from that and observe it, give it the space and the freedom to grow. Uh, see what fails, see what succeeds, and, um, I think it will teach the firm a lot, uh, about what works and what doesn’t work in relation to their specific, uh, driver, set of drivers and their specific dynamics.
Bim Dave: Yeah. No, agreed. Agreed. I think, I think, um, what you’re kind of talking about is, is true transformation, right? Of a business. And I fear that there’s some firms that will be so focused on the technology and focusing on today, the way they operate today, and leveraging technology to be able to automate some of those processes without actually thinking about how do we actually redesign the underlying business model, right?
And I think that’s, that’s what you’re alluding to, and I think that, that makes a lot of sense to me.
Bjarne Tellmann: And, and that is, you know, that kind of adaptive innovation where you, you try and harness the tools that are emerging to make your existing model more effective or, you know, more streamlined is a classic, uh, you know, is a classic, uh, behavior that dominant players often exhibit, right? Um, disruptive innovation where you really are trying to blow up the entire model is, um, is far less common.
Uh, but it– unfortunately, I just don’t think that’s sustainable. And I also think that in many cases, you know, focusing on the technology is the wrong place to start.
I really do think whether you’re in-house or whether you’re in a firm, starting with: What is it that I’m actually trying to do here? Um, you know, why do I do the things I do?
What is it that gives me a license to succeed with my current model? Um, and then what’s preventing that model from, uh, from succeeding? What is– what are the bottlenecks that, um, I’m trying to solve for? That’s a much better place to begin than, “Gee, we need to, you know, we need to roll out AI, so let’s find a tool.
Let’s roll it out. Let’s, you know, let’s call Anthropic. Let’s have them wire up our firm.” You know, why, why are you doing that? And how is that going to, you know– how’s that gonna improve anything for you versus for, for Anthropic? Um, that, that’s really the fundamental question, and I think before diving in, one should really, uh, have a deep strategic dive and understand those drivers carefully, uh, and then have a, a proposal around what it is that might solve your biggest problems.
Bim Dave: Hmm. Yeah. No, absolutely. So, so if I’m a, a general counsel listening to this episode today, what, what, what should I be doing in the next 12 months to prepare for this, this big shift?
Bjarne Tellmann: Well, I mean, I think I would be, um, I would be thinking about there’s sort of a number of levers that GCs typically, uh, focus on, right? Um, the first is protecting the company, um, you know, uh, uh, compliance, litigation, et cetera. The second is, you know, really around sort of how do you clear pathways to speed up business transactions, clear regulatory pathways, uh, remove obstacles, negotiate, uh, rapidly so that the deal can close on time.
The third, uh, is y- how do you translate what you do into value that the CFO understands? Um, how do I translate what legal does in a way that, um, uh, that resonates with, with the business? Those three have always been there, and there are ways that you can leverage technology to accelerate all of them.
And my advice would be to be thinking deeply about how do you, uh, how do you use that technology?
How do you redesign your delivery model, um, and put technology at the heart of some of those tasks? The fourth, however, um, is around scale, speed and scale.
Um, and not just in legal, but taking a step back as a general counsel and looking at what’s happening inside our company. Um, wow, they’re rolling out agentic systems in our customer service department.
They’re, uh– They, they have micro flash auctions happening online in milliseconds, right? They, they have dispatchers that are sending things to customers autonomously and closing, uh, procurement deals, uh, maybe small, small amounts, uh, i-in real time, right? H-How am I set up to help govern that? Um, and, and that fourth level of scale really comes to, uh, I think, uh, y- if you think carefully about it, a conclusion that governance becomes a key value driver for general counsel in this era.
So not just thinking about how I set myself up for success, how do I set the company up for success? And
what guardrails do I need to make sure are in place, uh, so that these systems operate effectively and safely, but, um, sustainably as well, right? And, um, that is a big piece of work. It’s not one that just GCs are accountable for, but I think very few GCs are voluntarily inserting themselves into that.
They’re thinking, “This is something this chief technology officer needs to deal with.” Well, let me tell you something. If, if you leave this up to the CTO, um, you will not have the regulatory guardrails in these systems so that, uh, they comply with the law. Um, and you will find yourself struggling for years trying to operate within a framework that you had no hand in setting up.
And when it blows up
The board is going to come to you and is going to ask, “Well, where were you? Uh, why, why these systems are not complying with the law, how is that possible? Where was the legal department in all of this?” So I think really thinking about speed, scale, and governance as that fourth driver is going to be a really key, um, uh, uh, you know, objective.
And if I think about the sort of picture of success that you wanna aim for as a general counsel, it would be– you know, I live in Germany right now, you know, we, we have this thing called the Autobahn, which is a, you know, uh, kind of a rarity in the world, where you legally, um, for large stretches can drive as fast as your talent and your car will take you.
Um, uh, that only works because there are clear guardrails, norms, uh, lane changing, uh, uh, you know, norms. The, the bends and the curves in the road are made so that a car can take that curve at 250 kilometers an hour and not wipe out, right? So it’s, it’s a sustainable velocity is what the Autobahn enables.
And where actually can we put humans out of the loop altogether, um, and how do we pilot these things? And how– what do we feed them in terms of guardrails? So that’s what I’d be, I’d be looking at sort of two things. One is, how do I construct my own, uh, structure? Um, and then two is, how do I help the company build the guardrails and governance it needs to accelerate sustainably?
Um, and, and maybe just in the first one, uh, you know, there’s an image that I often talk about, uh, which is the gazellephant. Um, the idea is you wanna have a stable, elephant-like back end to your legal department. You want structures, models, technology, uh, that is reliable, uh, and that can power things, uh, in a, in a safe and steady way.
And you need, uh, emergent front-end capabilities. You need people embedded with the business who can move at the speed of that business, empowered, uh, by that technology. And they’re the kind of gazelle on the front end. And so you have this fictional, uh, image of a gazellephant
Bim Dave: gazellephant
Bjarne Tellmann: stable and elephant-like on the back end and gazelle-like on the front end.
Uh, that’s, um, that’s maybe the, the analogy I’d use for, uh, that first part of your mission.
Bim Dave: Yeah. No, ab-absolutely. And, and if you were a law firm leader, is there any additional, um, advice that you would give to them if they wanted to remain strategically relevant to, to their clients in future?
Bjarne Tellmann: I think spending time with your management, uh, committee, spending time with your innovation committee, bringing in, uh, outside views, particularly views that understand what’s happening with the client, is a very important first step. Um, and I spend a lot of time with firms doing just that, uh, where I’m– It never ceases to amaze me, you know, how as lawyers, we– on the one hand, we have this,
Um, You know, we have almost a fixation with clients, you know, client loyalty, uh, fiduciary duties r-relating to the client, um, representing the client to the fullest of our abilities and so forth.
On the other hand, we have this curious lack of, of sort of interest in or curiosity about what’s actually happening with clients, what’s driving their behavior, what’s their– what does their world look like? What are the, you know, what are the trends and things that are shaping your client’s industry? Um, often very little interest in that from the legal, uh, from the law firm world in particular.
Um, and that’s in marked contrast to every CEO I’ve ever worked for inside large FTSE companies, where they lie awake at night worrying about what’s happening with the customer and, uh, how is the customer experience changing, what are their needs, uh, what incentives, uh, are driving their, um, their realities, and what does that mean for us and what we deliver and, uh, you know, do they still want us?
I think firm– law firm leaders need to get a client voice, a clear client voice in the room,
not, Not,
What do clients want, because often they will tell you they want what you’re giving them. People wanted a faster horse and buggy until a car came along, right? So it’s like clients don’t necessarily know what they want until they suddenly do.
Um, so don’t ask them what they want. Ask them what’s happening with them, what’s going on inside their business.
How is technology impacting the way their business is operating? I think that’s a place to begin. Uh, and once you understand that, then you can have some conversations that are strategic in nature and are we set up to deliver on the jobs that our clients need to have done in the AI era?
Uh, but to do that, you need to first understand what those jobs are that need to be done, and those jobs are changing
Bim Dave: Hmm. So, so when, when you’re advising, um, your clients on strategy, transformation, and leadership through, uh, Fieldstream Advisors, where are you seeing legal leaders getting the stuck– getting stuck the most when, when they’re thinking about their ambitions, um, and then turning that into execution?
Bjarne Tellmann: So I think the biggest– Well, there are two, probably two areas. Um, the, the biggest one is, is one that we kind of touched on conceptually, this over-focus on technology. I mean, just super easy to get seduced by the technology and, and, not realize actually, in many cases, the biggest obstacles to your success are strategic and, and operational.
So how are we delivering services today? How can we optimize that more effectively? Forget technology, just like, what are we doing today? And where are the, where are the, where are the challenges in, in our current delivery system? Uh, and very often what you’ll find is – that’s an excellent place to begin because,
Um, there are many things you can solve without investing huge amounts of money in AI.
Um, and if you focus there, you’ll understand what technology solutions ultimately will hyper-power, uh, those, those solutions. So it’s a, it’s, it’s a sequencing that I think is one big challenge that people stumble on. They kind of get lost in the world of vendors pitching them lots of shiny new things and, and then they, they lose sight of what, what they’re actually trying to solve for.
Um, and then the second, you know, big challenge is around change, uh, and managing and leaning into and navigating through the organizational change that is required. So it’s super easy to draw up on a piece of paper, uh, what a delivery model will look like, um, for the AI era once you understand where your clients are heading and, uh, and where your bottlenecks are, and, you know.
So, you can put that on paper. It’s another thing to actually make that happen. And I’ve lived that, um, as general counsel in a number of, uh, contexts and, you know-
I, I think the human element, the emotional element, the, uh, the challenge of pressing through at the deepest point in the valley of transformation is, uh, really, really hard and really hard to do on your own.
Um, and it’s super easy to just declare victory, uh, down in the valley and go home a- and just go back to whatever it was you were doing before because, um, people will resist and people will have views. And I think, um, you know, just one tip there is it’s– As a leader of a firm or a company, it’s very, very easy to focus on the what and the how of what you’re doing, and not on the why.
Why are we doing this? Why are you making me– Why are you putting my job at risk? Why are you making this change to how I do things? I– Why do you think you have a better way of doing it than how I have always done it? Um, uh, you know, and why should I help you? You know, uh, these are questions that you need to engage, uh, with, um, with your team on, and they’re very uncomfortable, and it, um, can result in shouting matches and people getting upset and, you know, breaking things.
And you, you just, you have to, you have to go through that, um, to get to the other side. And, um, I find that’s another big, big obstacle.
Bim Dave: Yeah. No, I can absolutely see that happening. Well, thank you for that, uh, Bjarne. That was, um, really, really helpful advice. Um, so I wanna move to some wrap-up questions, if I may, um, and, and just ask the first one, which is if you could go back to yourself at 18 years old, um, in Doctor Who’s time machine, what advice would you give yourself?
Bjarne Tellmann: I think I would say, um, you know, probably the thing I didn’t know at the time, um, is to remain future literate. Um, and, and what I mean by that is really have a deep sense of curiosity, not just about what’s happening right in front of you, but what’s happening out in the world. Um, but always try and apply that curiosity and what you learn to, uh, sort of at a practical level, what does this mean for me?
What does this mean for what I’m doing? How can I use this piece of knowledge or insight to make that better? Um, so it’s that combination of being super curious and roving and sucking in information from all kinds of places, and then letting that information, um, meld in your mind in ways that are, you know, structured towards a-adapting it for the reality that you see ahead of you.
Uh, that’s one thing I would definitely be, uh, focused on. I guess the other is just to remind myself how fast it all goes . You know? It’s like, uh, before you know it, you’re, you’re sort of, you’re at the end of your career. So, you know, um, there’s no time like the present and, um, don’t be afraid of taking risks.
Don’t be afraid of,
Um, uh, seizing opportunities that come along that inspire you, um, because if you don’t do it now, you probably won’t do it, and you will… I’ve seen people live to, to regret that. Um, f-fortunately, it’s something– That’s advice that I kinda took for myself. I’ve always been willing to do that, but it’s something I do see, uh, a large number, uh, of, uh, former colleagues and friends who fail to do.
And it’s, like, easy to take the easy way, um, but the e-easy way has a price. A-and it’s a price you pay at the end of your career when you look back.
Bim Dave: Yeah. Very true. Very true. Um, and, and just finally, um, we, we were chatting at the start of, uh, the show about, uh, you, you being a man of the world and traveling around.
What, what’s your favorite travel destination in the world that you’ve seen, that you’ve been to so far?
Bjarne Tellmann: That’s such a difficult question. Um, I, I see amazing things about virtually every place I’ve– I, I go to. Um, I would say that a, a city I keep coming back to that I lived in for a number of years and that never, um, never wears out for me, uh, is Tokyo. And I think in many ways, Tokyo, uh, one of the things that fascinates me– I mean, there’s so many things.
The, the, the people, the culture, the, uh, the speed and the pace of the place.
Um, but one of the things that fascinates me is how Tokyo manages, as a city of 34 million people, to organize itself in such an incredibly meticulous, careful, thoughtful way, and yet at the front end, it’s so emergent and dynamic and exciting and, um, and it kinda comes back a little bit to there’s almost a– there’s an element of the gazelle effect, um, in how Tokyo set itself up.
It, it makes big fundamental decisions about what’s important in a city. We’re going to have subway systems, we’re going to have narrow streets, we’re gonna, you know… And what’s not. We’re not gonna zone,
Uh, in a way that makes it impossible, uh, for people to start new businesses. We are gonna care about that narrow street, but we’re also gonna allow you to open a noodle shop on the fifth floor next to a dental office, and we’re gonna allow you to hang a neon sign out the window to attract people.
And it’s that combination of thoughtful backend structure and scaffolding with,
um, with c- care and attention to the emergent front end, the creative energy that you can unleash inside that structure that makes Tokyo such a, uh, such a deeply fascinating place and, and one that i-is both exciting and safe at the same…
But it’s just a, it’s a wonderful city, so I’d highly recommend it to anyone who, um, uh, who’s looking for a good place to go.
Bim Dave: I love that. Great, great advice. Bjarne, thank you. It’s been fascinating to talk to you today. Um, so much value, uh, for the audience, uh, from, from our conversation, so I really appreciate that.
Um, now your f- your– The book that we talked about, “Law in the Era of AI,” um, tell us a little bit about that in terms of when, when is it released? Um, how can… If somebody’s interested in getting it, how do they get it?
Bjarne Tellmann: Yeah. So it’s called “Law in the Era of AI: Clients, Firms, and the Future of the Legal Industry.” It’s out now. Um, it, uh, it actually launched in May and it’s published by Wiley, but it’s available, uh, everywhere good books are sold, as they say. Um, I, I– if you go on Amazon, you’ll find it. Um, but, uh, it’s, it’s on a million other sites as well.
Uh, you can get it in hard copy. You can also get it, um, in digital copy. And, um, I would love to hear what people think of it. Um, and, uh, feel free to write to me on LinkedIn and let me know what you what you thought.
Bim Dave: Amazing. Thank you very much again for joining us today. Uh, really appreciate it. And to everybody listening, thank you for joining us on “The Legal Helm.” If you enjoyed this conversation, please follow the podcast and share this episode with someone shaping the future of legal services. Until next time.