Speaking on a recent episode of The Lawyers Weekly Show, produced in partnership with York Hamilton, Evan Kostopoulos discussed the future of remote talent and offshoring as well as the benefits of implementing automation and tech.

York Hamilton provides global workforce solutions, and despite there still being a “strong belief” in the way law firms should be run, Kostopoulos said that in recent years, things have definitely started to shift.

“In the last five years, things have changed so much. Law firms are obviously using a lot more automation software, have different structures around the way they run, and are adopting new, different technologies. And COVID, obviously, forced a lot of that. So, I think they are changing,” he said.

“And because we’re on this side of the fence, we see it a lot. So even though the industry doesn’t necessarily want to show it, because we’re on the inside, we understand that they are adopting, they are changing.”

However, Kostopoulos noted that he’s still witnessing “hesitancy around change and adopting new methods of working” from firms and leaders.

“We know that the path to changing and making an impact is disrupting something. So, there is going to be a bit of back and forth, pull and push. But it’s already happening now with certain pieces of software within the legal industry; five [to] 10 years ago, no one was using certain tools. Now, 95 per cent of firms are using those tools,” he said.

“Twenty years ago, no accounting firm had offshore staff. Now, 93 per cent of them use offshore staff. If we look at advertising, for example, before Facebook ads or advertising was a method people were doing, there were billboards, there was radio. Things change, and it’s fortunately or unfortunately going to go that way, too.”

Following a lot of significant change in the profession over the last five years, in another five years’ time, the legal landscape will look very different – with more firms likely to adopt a “hybrid approach” with fully remote lawyers and some in the office, predicted Kostopoulos.

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“Now, it’s more the younger firms really taking on board tech and offshoring and going in that direction. A hybrid approach, I think, will be really successful where you’ve got your in-house lawyers, let’s call them, really taking on the high-level work that a robot, a person, a paralegal overseas may not be able to have the skills to do that, nor would you want to because, obviously, having a remote person or having a piece of tech, they can’t appear in court, they can’t sign off documentation. So, there are limitations,” he said.

“So, I think the hybrid approach of having that high-level in-house person, having that talent offshore, having the tech involved in your firm, that hybrid approach for me needs to happen. I don’t think [that] in five years, there’s going to be one lawyer with an AI tool running 20 files a day. I don’t think that’s ever going to happen. Or maybe in 20 years, but definitely not in five. But I think that hybrid approach, the quicker companies can adopt that, the quicker they will see growth or optimisation.”

Moreover, firms and legal leaders should be excited about these changes and about automation rather than afraid, Kostopoulos said.

“Ultimately, it’s going to make their life easier. I highly believe that. I’ve seen it in a lot of other industries because starting with York Hamilton, we worked across a few industries, so we’ve seen it already really making huge impacts. Same should apply for law firms. It’s going to make their lives easier if they adopt it and take it with both hands,” he said.

“Sometimes, I say to clients, well, you’re the issue. It’s not the tool. It’s not the offshore stuff. You need to adopt it. You need to accept it. The benefits financially, the benefits in terms of scaling and optimising, we’re not talking about five or 10 per cent cutting the bottom line. We’re not talking about optimising a little bit. We’re talking about big changes that can overnight change the way a firm operates.”

The transcript of this podcast episode was slightly edited for publishing purposes. To listen to the full conversation with Evan Kostopoulos, click below:

Lauren Croft

Lauren is a journalist at Lawyers Weekly and graduated with a Bachelor of Journalism from Macleay College. Prior to joining Lawyers Weekly, she worked as a trade journalist for media and travel industry publications and Travel Weekly. Originally born in England, Lauren enjoys trying new bars and restaurants, attending music festivals and travelling. She is also a keen snowboarder and pre-pandemic, spent a season living in a French ski resort.