Legal profession must change with the times or be left behind.

Despite disruptive technologies and increased competition from nonlawyers, the future for lawyers is bright if they are willing to retool their firms' business models, incorporate emerging technologies into their practices, and tap into underserved markets.

"There are a lot of things you can automate and outsource and algorithm to your heart's content, but there is still a whole bunch of things you need a human lawyer for," said Jordan Furlong, a lawyer, consultant, and legal industry analyst who forecasts the impact of the changing legal market on lawyers, clients, and legal organizations. "You need our judgment, you need our counsel, you need our courage, and you need our wisdom."

Furlong provided the keynote address at the presidential showcase seminar "Deep Impact: Climate Change, Competition, and the New Legal Market" at the Bar's Annual Convention in Orlando.

The seminar also marked the end of the first year of the three-year quest of the Vision 2016 Commission to identify the challenges that lie ahead for lawyers.

"We have to change the culture of not just our own lives, but of our judiciary and our legal practices so that we can be more efficient," said immediate past President Eugene Pettis, who created the commission. "That's what I want to get out of Vision 2016 as we move forward."

The Vision 20 16 Commission's four subcommittees are studying technology, legal education, bar admissions, and access to legal services so as to build "a roadmap to come up with some kind of deliverables," as the commission moves into its second and third years.

The seminar provided strategies and tactics to emerge from this time of disruption stronger and better able to serve clients.

The Outdated Business Model

"If you are in a law firm today, then you are operating within a business model that evolved in a very different time, a very different climate than what we have today," said Furlong, a Canadian lawyer and consultant to law firms on strategic and tactical issues with Edge International.

He said the difficulties dinosaurs encountered with the cataclysmic impact of an asteroid that dramatically altered their environment is analogous to what lawyers are currently facing.

"The dinosaurs existed for 200 million years," Furlong said. "How did they do that? Because they were masters at adaptation. They evolved perfectly to fit the environment of their time. But when that environment changed very suddenly, very severely, they could not adapt fast...