Swishhhh! The sound of LEGO® bricks pouring onto the floor is the sound of playtime. As a kid, I’d pull open a new box of LEGO® bricks and follow the instructions to build the toy shown on the box. At the end of a building session, I’d have a new toy to use in imaginary space adventures, ocean voyages, or car races.

The more I played with LEGO® bricks, the less committed I became to sticking with the toy shown on the box. I still followed the instructions the first time, but it was more fun to use the knowledge gained from building others’ creations to improve my own designs. Nowadays, I’d be as content with a box of simple rectangular bricks as I would be with one of the fancy sets you see in stores.

The progression from instruction-follower to creative builder is not limited to LEGO® building. Rather, it’s the process of innovation: learn, build, repeat. LEGO® bricks are like individual pieces of knowledge. We first learn how to combine those pieces to form knowledge already developed by others. As we gain experience, we use our foundation of knowledge to build our own creations. For example, we learn to use letters to create words and words to build sentences. Much later, we use our developed knowledge of language to write laws to create a justice system.

The legal industry, like all industries, has innovated over time. However, in recent years the pace of that innovation has increased. “Old” knowledge is being combined with “new” knowledge to create more affordable, accessible, and efficient legal services.

Looking into a box of LEGO® bricks can be daunting if you’re not sure how to put the pieces together to create a useful structure. Looking into the increasing storm of knowledge, tools, and hype of legal innovation can be daunting as you seek to create or even just operate in the legal industry.

The purpose of this blog is to explore the building blocks, both old and new, of innovation in legal services. Some blocks will be in the form of knowledge or ideas, others in the form of tools. We’ll also look at completed sets of blocks that form new products and services. In so doing, we’ll bring some order to the chaos of innovation in the legal industry. We’ll draw inspiration from the “blocks” and “sets” we learn about to create new ways of delivering legal services.

Playtime is about to begin. Will you join me?

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