Change Management: How to Get Lawyers and Staff to Buy-In to Change

Bill leads the implementation of Thompson Hine’s practice innovation initiatives and the SmartPaTH® legal services delivery model as a core competency of the firm. Bill supports the development of legal project management and related processes, procedures and tools; coaches firm lawyers on SmartPaTH® techniques; and works with our clients to foster more efficient legal service delivery processes. He supports practice groups in new product and service initiatives, identifies emerging new market opportunities, and sponsors the development of pioneering technologies.

He is a founding faculty member of the Association of Corporate Counsel’s Legal Service Management Workshop series, which focuses on value-based fee structures and the management skills and tools needed to support them.

Recognized by the ABA as a Legal Rebel and by the Financial Times Innovative Lawyers (North America) as one of top 20 most innovative lawyers, Michele is a professor at the University of Miami School of Law, affiliated faculty in Harvard Law School Executive Education program, and the founder of LawWithoutWalls, a multi-disciplinary, international executive education community of more than 2,000 lawyers, business professionals, entrepreneurs, and law and business students.

Michele is an author, speaker, and consultant on innovation, culture creation, and teaming. Through her company MOVEL?W, Michele creates bespoke, experiential-learning workshops grounded in design thinking to transform how lawyers collaborate and create culture change. Michele writes about the growing intersections between law, business, and legal innovation. She has recently published two books. Her book, Legal Upheaval: A Guide to Creativity, Collaboration, and Innovation in Law leverages more than 100 interviews with General Counsels at international corporations and Heads of Innovation at law firms. The other book, New Suits: Appetite for Disruption in the Legal World (co-curated with Dr. Guenther Dobrauz) includes chapters by experts in law, innovation, and technology to provide a global perspective on the future of our diverse legal service delivery ecosystem.

Michele earned her B.A., magna cum laude, from Dartmouth and J.D., magna cum laude, from Harvard Law School.

Ari Kaplan, an attorney and legal industry analyst, is an inaugural Fastcase 50 honoree, a fellow of the College of Law Practice Management, and a finalist for the International Legal Technology Association’s Thought Leader of the Year award. He is the author of Reinventing Professional Services: Building Your Business in the Digital Marketplace (Wiley, 2011) and The Opportunity Maker: Strategies for Inspiring Your Legal Career Through Creative Networking and Business Development (West Academic, 2nd Ed. 2016). Kaplan serves as the principal researcher for a variety of widely distributed benchmarking reports, has been the keynote speaker for events worldwide, and is the founder of the Lawcountability? business development software platform and iPhone app. He is an avid swimmer, a self-taught, beginner-level python coder, and a two-time Ironman triathlon finisher.

Ralph served as Chairman & CEO of Orrick for nearly a quarter century, leading the firm as it expanded, diversified and extended its geographic reach, transforming from a domestic firm with California origins to become one of the world’s most prominent global law firms, with more than 1,100 lawyers in 25 offices across the United States, Europe and Asia.

Ralph launched several groundbreaking initiatives that modernized the way Orrick operated and served its clients, including establishing the legal industry’s first on-shore operations center in Wheeling, West Virginia in 2001, affirmatively embracing technology, and instituting non-traditional talent and pricing models, distinguishing the firm as a bold innovator.

The American Lawyer named Ralph one of the “Top 50 Big Law Innovators of the Last 50 Years.” In naming Ralph among the “Most Innovative Managing Partners,” Law360’s editors said Ralph “has left an indelible mark not only on [Orrick]… but also the larger practice by upending traditional career models, rejiggering payment structures and transforming the business of law in many other innovative ways.”

Recognized as one of America’s “100 Most Influential Lawyers” by The National Law Journal, Ralph has long been a frequent speaker on business leadership and the evolution of the legal profession. He is the founder of the Law Firm Leaders Forum, one of the most significant gatherings of law firm leaders that annually examines the critical issues facing the legal profession.

Before becoming Chairman and CEO, Ralph practiced employment law and led Orrick’s highly regarded Employment Law Department, which he founded as a second year associate. He was recognized as one of the “Nation’s Best Litigators in Employment Law” by The National Law Journal, acting as trusted advisor to Fortune 50 clients. During his years as a practicing lawyer, he lectured and wrote extensively on developments in the law, and testified on employment law issues before the California State Senate and the U.S. House of Representatives.