Drills and holes: Difference between revisions

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{{a|design|
{{a|design|
[[File:Hammer.jpg|thumb|450px|center|How to philosophise with a hammer.]]
[[File:Hammer.jpg|thumb|450px|center|How to philosophise with a hammer.]]
}}{{quote|“We don’t want to sell you Life Insurance ... we want you to know ''what life insurance will do''. A quarter million drills were sold last year: no one wants a drill. What they want is the hole.”
}}{{quote|We don’t want to sell you Life Insurance . . we want you to know and have ''what life insurance will do''. A 1/4 million drills were sold last year: no one wants a [[drills and holes|drill]]. What they want is the hole.
:—The ''Manhattan Mutual Life Company'' 1946}}
:—The ''Manhattan Mutual Life Company'' advertisement, Manhattan Kansas, 1946}}
{{quote|“I don’t think it works like that at all. You see an electric drill in a shop and decide you want it. Then you take it home and wander around your house looking for excuses to drill holes in things.”
{{quote|“I don’t think it works like that at all. You see an electric drill in a shop and decide you want it. Then you take it home and wander around your house looking for excuses to drill holes in things.”
:—Llewelyn Thomas<ref>Quoted in {{author|Rory Sutherland}}’s magnificent {{br|Alchemy}}.</ref>}}
:—Llewelyn Thomas, quoted in {{author|Rory Sutherland}}’s {{br|Alchemy}}}}
{{quote|“To a man with a hammer, everything looks like a nail.”  
{{quote|“To a man with a hammer, everything looks like a nail.”  
:—Mark Twain}}
:—{{author|Mark Twain}}}}
That what a customer wants is the proverbial hole in the wall and not the drill that puts it there is a favourite trope of legal futurologists.<ref>See for example, Professor Richard Susskind’s ''[[The Future of Law]]'' (1996), which alas is now out of print. Wonder if he saw ''that'' future.</ref>
That a customer wants a hole, not a drill, is a favourite trope of legal futurologist Professor Richard Susskind.<ref>See {{br|The Future of Law}} (1996; now out of print. Bet he didn’t see ''that'' coming.)</ref>


Their message for the profession is this: your “drills” are preposterous, clunky, expensive things. Your customers do not like them —  never have — but until now have had no real choice. Now they do. There are new ways of putting holes in walls.
His message for those in the legal profession is: do not assume that users of the legal system are irrevocably tied to how it currently works. Clients want ''outcomes.'' How the legal machinery by which these outcomes are delivered ''works'' is of little interest to them; what matters is (i) that the outcome ''works''; (ii) that it is ''cheap''; (iii) that it is ''quick''.  


So, beware: do not assume that users of the legal system are irrevocably tied to how it currently works. Clients want ''outcomes.'' How the legal machinery by which these outcomes are delivered ''works'' is of little interest to them; what matters is ''that'' it works, that it is ''cheap'' and that it is ''quick''. Traditional drills don’t and aren’t.
So: all this carry-on with [[Jolly Contrarian Law Reports|law report]]s, dusty [[legal opinion]]s, horsehair wigs and so on is incidental bunk. No-one, necessarily, wants it. The rational moderniser’s refrain:  or risk being driven out of business.
 
So: all this carry-on with [[Jolly Contrarian Law Reports|law reports]], dusty [[Legal opinion|legal opinions]], horsehair wigs, [[time and attendance]] and so on is incidental bunk. No-one, necessarily, wants it.


=== Come the revolution — ===
=== Come the revolution — ===
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It is an ongoing source of frustration for the legal imagineers out there, that the fundamental structures of the legal profession ''haven’t'' been revolutionised. They’ve ''rolled with the punches''.  
It is an ongoing source of frustration for the legal imagineers out there, that the fundamental structures of the legal profession ''haven’t'' been revolutionised. They’ve ''rolled with the punches''.  


Professor Susskind had in mind flying robo-taxis and hoverboards. What we have is Uber and electric scooters. You might say is no bad thing: [[thought leader]]s say, “yes, yes, yes: but the revolution is yet to happen, and happen it surely must.”<ref>See, for example, [https://www.allenovery.com/en-gb/global/news-and-insights/legal-innovation/the-future-of-the-in-house-legal-function this curious piece] from [[A&O]].</ref>
Professor Susskind had in mind flying robo-taxis and hoverboards. What we have is Uber and electric scooters. You might say is no bad thing: [[thought leader]]s say, “yes, yes, yes: but the revolution is yet to happen, and happen it surely must.”<ref>See for example [https://www.allenovery.com/en-gb/global/news-and-insights/legal-innovation/the-future-of-the-in-house-legal-function this curious piece] from [[A&O]].</ref>


Yet, we have had all manner of changed circumstances thrown at us since the developed world lost its [[David Bowie|major stabilising influence]] in January 2016: political insurrection. Disease. Dislocation. War. Prince died. All of these things, you would think, would accelerate the rate of change. But the only constant since then has been the ongoing good health of the traditional legal industry.  
Yet, we have had all manner of changed circumstances thrown at us since the developed world lost its [[David Bowie|major stabilising influence]] in January 2016: political insurrection. Disease. Dislocation. War. Prince died. All of these things, you would think, would accelerate the rate of change. But the only constant since then has been the ongoing good health of the traditional legal industry.  
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''If''.   
''If''.   


But it is Llewelyn Thomas’s quip that has the ring of truth. We go to [[Allen & Overy]] not because it gives the best advice, but ''because it is [[Allen & Overy]]''. Ex-[[Magic circle law firm|magic circle]] [[partner]]<nowiki/>s routinely find this to their disappointment when the phone stops ringing.
But it is Llewelyn Thomas’s quip that has the ring of truth. We go to [[Allen & Overy]] not because it gives the best advice, but ''because it is [[Allen & Overy]]''. Ex-[[Magic circle law firm|magic circle]] [[partner]]<nowiki/>s routinely find this to their disappointment when the phone stops ringing.


It isn’t the ''hole'' people want: ''it’s the drill''. We can believe this is not so, but only by denying facts as they ''appear'' to us in favour of a mental model that ''appeals'' to us.  
It isn’t the ''hole'' people want: ''it’s the drill''. We can believe this is not so, but only by denying facts as they ''appear'' to us in favour of a mental model that ''appeals'' to us.  


=== Law as a complex system ===
=== Law as a complex system ===
The legal ecosystem developed in the way it did not ''despite'' customer demand but ''in response to it''. But not just customer demand: practitioner demand, societal demands and all the other multifarious demands, contingencies, [[Power structure|hierarchies]] and doctrines that the wider [[complex system|system]]. The legal system is, well, a ''[[system]]'': a web of [[complex]] interactions: stocks, flows and feedback loops, subroutines, submerged agendas and [[Conflicts of interest|conflicting interest]]<nowiki/>s that push it into a gently morphing pseudo-equilibrium.
The legal ecosystem developed in the way it did not ''despite'' customer demand but ''in response to it''. But not just customer demand: practitioner demand, societal demands and all the other multifarious demands, contingencies, [[Power structure|hierarchies]] and doctrines that the wider [[complex system|system]]. The legal system is, well, a ''[[system]]'': a web of [[complex]] interactions: stocks, flows and feedback loops, subroutines, submerged agendas and [[Conflicts of interest|conflicting interest]]<nowiki/>s that push it into a gently morphing pseudo-equilibrium.  


Re-imagining this whole system from scratch through the simplistic lens of a four-box chart<ref>There is a lot of this in Susskind’s {{Br|The End of Lawyers?}} (2010)</ref> ignores the institutions, conventions, [[Power structure|hierarchies]] and deeply ingrained structures, embedded in glacial [[Pace layering|pace layers]], that are there, in significant part, to protect the system from sudden shocks and, yes, to protect the selfish interests of the multitudes that presently thrive within it. That deliver [[certainty]]. That provide the stability that is necessary to deliver a reliable hole in the wall, or — if that is what the customer wants — that deliver a shiny new drill with lots of buttons, lights and a badge saying “[[A&O]]” on it.
Re-imagining this whole system from scratch through the simplistic lens of a four-box chart<ref>There is a lot of this in Susskind’s {{Br|The End of Lawyers?}} (2010)</ref> ignores the institutions, conventions, [[Power structure|hierarchies]] and deeply ingrained structures, embedded in glacial [[Pace layering|pace layers]], that are there, in significant part, to protect the system from sudden shocks and, yes, to protect the selfish interests of the multitudes that presently thrive within it. That deliver [[certainty]]. That provide the stability that is necessary to deliver a reliable hole in the wall, or — if that is what the customer wants — that deliver a shiny new drill with lots of buttons, lights and a badge saying “[[A&O]]” on it.
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