Legally On the Move: Careers, Tech & Insights from Dubai – Darren Kantor – E11

You can hear Rob and Darren discussing:

– Darren’s Thoughts on AI as it Reshapes Legal Services

– The Numerous Challenges of Adopting New Forms of Legal Tech

– Legal Tech Events and Education

– The Expanding Legal Hub Based in the UAE

– The Importance of Humans Throughout Legal Tech Transformation

Connect with Darren here – https://www.linkedin.com/in/darren-kantor-0652755/?originalSubdomain=uk

 

Transcript

00:00

Welcome to legally on the move careers tech and insights from Dubai in this exclusive mini-series of the legally speaking podcast we’re taking you to the heart of Dubai a global hub for legal innovation cutting-edge technology and transformative career opportunities here’s what you’ll gain career inspiration unlock the secrets to thriving in Dubai’s dynamic legal market tech trends dive into how AI blockchain and legal tech are reshaping the industry diversity and leadership here from trailblazersis driving inclusivity and innovation in the UAE and Global Perspectives explore how Dubai’s unique blend of tradition and ambition is creating a thriving legal ecosystem.

00:40

Recorded in iconic locations, these episodes bring you the energy and insights of one of the world’s most exciting legal hubs.

00:48

Don’t just listen, experience the future of law.

00:50

Ready to move forward with us?

00:52

Let’s go.

00:53

So, welcome to the Legally Speaking podcast.

00:56

Name, title and organisation.

00:58

Thank you for having me.

01:00

I’m Darren Kantor.

01:01

I’m the Director and Global Head of Jameson Legal Tech.

01:04

You absolutely are.

01:05

And I must say it’s an absolute pleasure to be doing this with you live on a boat in Dubai.

01:09

Look at the scenery behind us.

01:10

Absolutely amazing.

01:11

Not just any boat.

01:12

It’s a yacht.

01:13

It’s a yacht.

01:13

Absolutely.

01:14

Only the best for legally speaking.

01:16

Only the best for legally speaking.

01:17

But let’s talk about the future of legal tech.

01:19

Obviously Jameson Legal’s very much got your fingers on the pulse.

01:22

How is Jameson Legal Techhelping law firms and in-house teams embrace digital transformation.

01:27

From our point of view, what we try and do is we try and educate the market.

01:31

So we sit in a very nice position because we kind of bridge the gap between the tech vendors, the law firms and the in-house legal teams.

01:40

We’re neutral for all of them, so it’s quite easy for us to work across the whole landscape.

01:44

SoOne of the things we’re doing is a lot of these events.

01:48

Yesterday we had the event in Dubai, bringing together law firms, showcasing technology, but making sure that when they come to the event, they’re actually getting value for giving up their time to be there.

01:58

One of the things we used to do, a couple of years back, we used to come over to Dubai, we’ve partnered with a few of the different software companies here, and we’ve put on a couple of social gatherings.

02:08

People would have a few drinks, they’d have some food.

02:11

And what we found is that as nice as it was to bring the community together, we couldn’t really show what the value was for people other than giving them a few drinks and some food.

02:19

So we wanted to change that and make it more about putting on an afternoon event where we have speakers come in, experts that have been through that digital transformation journey and showing their audience what they need to think about.

02:33

Like look at change management, look at the business, what do you need to start preparing for?

02:38

And then don’t just buy tech if you haven’t got the people for it.

02:41

Make sure you’ve got the people to help get it adopted as well.

02:43

So that’s kind of what we’re doing these days with these kind of events.

02:48

And then very quick answer on the other side of it, we partner with legal tech vendors, we introduce their technology to our law firms and then our in-house legal teams.

02:57

But it’s not just picking up the phone and saying, hey, look at this really nice all-signal dancing solution.

03:02

We’re actually understanding what their use cases are.

03:04

What issues are they having?

03:05

How can we make a difference?

03:07

How can the solutions that we’re working with make a difference?

03:09

And sometimes they don’t even know what theythemselves.

03:11

So it’s being able to advise them and listening to what their pain points are.

03:15

And then finally, I have to mention this side, because otherwise my colleague Paul Levy, who I think you know.

03:20

Yes, lovely chap.

03:21

Paul Levy, he moaned at me for not mentioning the legal tech recruitment side.

03:25

We help scale tech companies.

03:27

We take people from small companies to make them large and help them grow.

03:31

We recruit for the in-house legal market, and we recruit for law firms.

03:35

And these days what we’re doing isIt’s changed A lot.

03:40

You will probably see this more than most because you know the industry, but it’s all about the digital transformation, the legal technologists, all these new titles that have come up over the last couple of years.

03:48

And it’s really exciting because we sit on both sides.

03:52

We see the technology that’s being sold to these firms and we sit the other side where we’re helping those people that are selecting the technology actually build their careers and develop.

04:01

Yeah, and I think it’s a hugely exciting time generally in the world of legal and technology.

04:05

Of course, we have to talk about AI and automation within the law.

04:08

So what role do you see AI and automation playing in shaping the future of legal services and where do you see the biggest potential opportunities?

04:17

So I’m actually going to say something that goes against the grain and it’s something that I listened to yesterday at our conference.

04:24

People were talking about how AI is potentially replacing the junior lawyers, replacing the paralegals, replacing the entry-level lawyers’ roles because they’re using the AI and don’t need to hire those positions.

04:35

I actually think AIif it’s done in the right way, if it starts off in the universities and the education side of it, if we train people at an education level how to get the best out of technology, let’s take Copilot as an example.

04:49

If we can get the universities using Copilot, the university students that are studying for their law degrees to use Copilot as part of their studies and then showcase or show them how to use it in a working environment, they can come into the firms and make a huge difference.

05:03

It’s like,So, when we first started using emails many, many, many years ago, generally speaking, in an organization, you’d have one person in the company that would have an e-mail, and then they would distribute the messages to the rest of the team, and people weren’t kind of comfortable they were worried whether it’s the right way to work.

05:20

Now, e-mail is just…

05:21

It’s normal.

05:22

In fact, we’re even changing that approach now with how we do internal messaging with things like Microsoft Teams and things like that.

05:29

So I think if we start off with a younger generation adopting AI in the right way, then actually the future can look really exciting for some of these entry-level lawyers.

05:38

And they can really benefit from being the first ones to kind of bring AI through their education to work practice.

05:44

Yeah, and I think it’s, again, very, very exciting.

05:46

I think if we start at that level, then the opportunity for people in their careers is going to look very different to what it’s been historically.

05:52

But I think there’s a really excitement about that, particularly from the people that I’m speaking to.

05:55

Okay, let’s talk a little bit more about change management and legal tech.

05:58

You know, what are the biggest challenges law firms face when adopting new technology and how can they actually think about overcoming them?

06:05

A very obvious answer here for me, and this is what we’re seeing all the time.

06:10

Not having the people in place to adopt, to make sure the technology is being used.

06:14

There’s so many firms and in-house legal teams that will invest in very expensive legal technology.

06:21

And it fails.

06:22

It fails because they can’t get people using the technology.

06:25

It fails because it hasn’t been implemented the right way.

06:29

It has been shown to the business and to the people in the business how you can use it.

06:34

If it’s too difficult for someone to change, they won’t.

06:37

People don’t like change.

06:38

So you have to make sure you address that earlier on.

06:41

You have to go in and don’t go in and buy technology.

06:45

Go in and look at what do we need to do as a business first.

06:48

Before we buy the technology, so I think having the people in place is just as important.

06:53

I think I’ve heard a term used before: it’s not just about AI, it’s about PI.

06:58

So, artificial intelligence and people intelligence, the two should come hand in hand, and if you don’t invest in the people…

07:07

And it’s crazy because you’re investing in the technology.

07:09

Why wouldn’t you invest in the people to support that technology and get the best out of it and show the return of investment?

07:15

Yeah, really, really well said and absolutely support that.

07:17

I think, you know, you’ve got to reduce the overwhelm as well.

07:20

And by doing that, bringing the people on board, educating them, the more adoption, the far better it’s going to be.

07:24

It’s going to be a win-win all around.

07:26

One thing that I think you’re doing very well is you’re building a strong legal tech ecosystem.

07:30

But for the people who may not be as familiar, how are you going about building this really strong Jameson legal techcommunity, how are you doing that?

07:38

Are you collaborating with law firms, tech vendors, corporate legal teams?

07:41

Tell us a bit more.

07:42

Yeah, sure.

07:43

So first of all, we’re collaborating with Legally Speaking Podcast.

07:47

We love your show.

07:47

We think you’re great and what you’re doing is great.

07:49

And you were at our event yesterday and we would love to have you at more events.

07:53

So first of all, that’s something that we’ve just started doing with you, which is great.

07:57

We partner with lots of different legal tech companies.

07:59

The ones we work with, though, are the ones we actually believe in.

08:03

There’s 2 things we look at.

08:04

We have to like the tech and we have to like the people behind the tech.

08:07

Yes.

08:08

And if we do that, then we want to work with their solution.

08:12

So that’s the first thing, building strong partnerships.

08:15

and building good relationships with the law firms.

08:17

So actually, our business is part of Jameson Legal, the Jameson Legal Group.

08:21

So Jameson Legal started 15, 16 years ago now, placing lawyers in-house in law firms.

08:30

And that was a global coverage.

08:32

We were covering the UKSingapore, Middle East and the US.

08:38

So we were covering a wide area.

08:40

And we use that really as our kind of our engine to then build a legal tech consultancy.

08:46

So we’ve got the client base.

08:47

We havehundreds of thousands of lawyers on our database.

08:50

We, you know, we speak to those lawyers when we place them, we ask them about tech as well.

08:55

We follow up with them.

08:56

Every one of our consultants has been trained across not just recruitment, but all the different services that we offer as a business.

09:03

So we have Jameson Legal Tech, Jameson Consultancy Solutions, and obviously the parent company, which is Jameson Legal.

09:10

And between all of the different divisions, we train our staff to be able to discuss what we do.

09:16

Now, they’re not experts in legal tech, forexample.

09:18

So they’ll talk to the client, they’ll find out if they have any challenges or whether they’re looking at legal tech.

09:22

And if they are, they’ll put them in touch with my team and then we’ll discuss legal tech with them, we’ll discuss legal tech recruitment.

09:28

So that’s something we’re building a big presence with.

09:31

But actually, one of the most exciting things is these events we’re putting on, JLT Connect.

09:36

We’re touring around the world now, putting these events on from roundtable sessions with a guest speaker to come in.

09:43

We’re doing afternoon events that educate both law firms and in-house legal departments.

09:48

We’re doing a lot of educating so that people know us and they know our brand and they’re comfortable because we’re giving saying back to them.

09:55

And we don’t charge for them to come to the events.

09:57

It’s A complimentary event for them to attend.

09:59

But it’s really exciting because they come and they get to hear from people that have been there and done it.

10:03

And we always finish off with a Q&A.

10:06

Actually, we always finish off the whole event with drinks and canapes.

10:09

We make it worth their while.

10:10

We make them earn the drinks and canapes by sitting through some really good sessions.

10:14

We finish off with an interactive Q&A and all of these events we’ve done,and there’s always people that want to ask questions.

10:20

And actually the Q&A could go on for ages, but we have to obviously have a time limit on that, but it’s really fun and we enjoy listening to what people have to ask.

10:28

Yeah, and I was there, the most recent one, and I wanted to ask questions and I did ask questions.

10:33

I think the way it was structured, the energy, the quality of the content was very, very good.

10:38

Okay, just before we wrap up, let’s talk about the growing legal tech presence, particularly here in Dubai.

10:43

As I say, we’re filming on a yacht in Dubai.

10:44

It’s a beautiful place, but there is a real kind of energy aroundLegal tech that I’m seeing and hearing, so why is Dubai becoming a key hub for legal technology, and what trends are really driving this growth?

10:56

Yeah, so I’ve been coming over here for about 18 years now, so I know Dubai very well.

11:02

When I first started coming for business, probably five or six years ago…

11:09

People were talking about legal tech and they’d mentioned a couple of people’s names that you must speak to.

11:14

You’ve got to speak to this one, you’ve got to speak to that one.

11:16

And you’d meet with those people and they knew about legal tech, but they didn’t know about legal tech.

11:21

They weren’t experienced implementing over here or working with firms that were doing stuff around legal tech.

11:27

So it was a bit strange.

11:28

And it took a while for people to actually start getting the confidence to start bringing in new solutions and change the way they’re working.

11:34

It was just the same back home in the UK.

11:37

when technology first came in, or legal technology first came in, it was a slow process to get firms to use it.

11:43

Now you have to use it, otherwise you’re not going to have a business.

11:46

But over here was that even slower process because you have to build that trust.

11:51

Jamison Legal Tech as a company have been doing that for a while over here now, so that’s been really good.

11:55

So we’ve seen a lot of change now.

11:56

We’ve seen lots of firms implement technology.

12:00

I think they’re probably at a stage now where AI has slowly started to come in, but they’ve done all the other things first, which is the correct way of doing it.

12:06

They’ve looked at…

12:08

things like, what technology have they got themselves at the moment?

12:11

Is there tech in the wider business that actually they can benefit by using within legal?

12:16

Then they’ll look at the automation processes.

12:18

How can we automate certain processes that we’re doing?

12:21

And then they’ll start looking at, right, the basic legal tech stuff you need now as a firm, a document repository, a matter management, case management system, your legal practice management system, your legal front door, all these kind of solutions.

12:33

And a lot of those solutions have gotAI built into them.

12:36

They’ve got redlining tools, they’ve got CLM tools.

12:39

It’s quite exciting to see what’s out there.

12:41

So it gives them a chance to experience that through some of the standard systems that you need to have.

12:45

But then also, once you start getting a bit of confidence around that and a bit of confidence around tech, you can then start bringing AI in.

12:51

And that’s what they’re doing over here.

12:52

They’re now, the conference yesterday, I mean, I don’t think I’ve been to a conference over the last couple of years that hasn’t, that people haven’t spoken about AI.

12:59

It just doesn’t happen anymore.

13:02

But yesterday, people were really excited becauseIt’s now it’s only really just been started to be spoken about over here and it’s really exciting that they’re embracing it and I think lots of lots of law firms and in-house legal teams are going to they’re going to start biting the bullet and starting to invest in legal tech, especially the AI solutions.

13:20

And then back to your your question about Dubai and why is it such a hub?

13:25

It’s so easy to get to from so many different markets, you know, from Asia to get over here 7 hours from the UK 6 1/2 hours.

13:33

It’s such a good central point.

13:35

The US is obviously that little bit further, but they can have satellite offices here, which they were doing, and now they’re building actual offices over here, staffing them up and growing them over here because it’s such a great location for them to cover so many different regions as well.

13:47

So I think that’s a big location and the investment in this region.

13:52

I mean, Dubai is absolutely incredible.

13:54

If you’re thinking about a career and you want to do that abroad, this is one of the best places in the world to live because they look after you here.

14:01

You’re made to feel welcome.

14:03

They have all the infrastructure here for you.

14:05

And I think that there’s probably no better place in the world to live and work in the legal tech space now.

14:10

What a great place to end, and it’s been an absolute pleasure having you on the Legally Speaking podcast.

14:14

If folks want to know more about you, Jameson Legal Tech, and what you’re getting up to, where’s the best place for people to go and find out more, or what social media handles or websites?

14:22

Yeah, sure.

14:22

So you can, if you want to have a chat with me specifically about Jameson Legal Tech’s consultancy, I’m always available on e-mail, darren.counter@jamesonlegal.com.

14:33

You can go on our website.

14:34

We’re going to be launching a brand new website very soon.

14:36

But our website is great.

14:38

You can get loads of information on there, which is www..jamesonlegal.com.

14:42

Please follow our Jameson Legal Tech LinkedIn page.

14:45

We have a really good amount of followers on there.

14:47

We’re always putting content on there.

14:49

And we’ve put a lot of posts from our events, so you can see some of the photos from this event.

14:53

And I’m sure there’ll be quite a few of Rob as well.

14:55

So good place to start as well.

14:57

There we have it.

14:58

Well, Darren, it’s an absolute pleasure once again, but from all of us for now, over and out.

15:02

Thank you so much for tuning in to this episode of our Legally on the Move from Dubai series.

15:07

If you enjoyed today’s conversation, please take a moment to rate and review the show on your favorite podcast platform.

15:14

It really helps us out.

15:15

And if you want to connect with us directly, join our vibrant Legally Speaking Club community on Discord or visit our official website legallyspeakingpodcast.com for more updates and ways to get involved.

15:26

Stay tuned. We’ll see you again soon.

15:28

Over and out.