Many would be aware of our passion for up front, guaranteed fixed pricing rather than the traditional time-billing model of most law firms – previous posts explore this in more detail http://blog.viewlegal.com.au/search/label/fixed%20pricing.
Much of our inspiration in this regard comes from the VeraSage Institute, a revolutionary international think tank which, for many years, has been challenging professional services firms to price their services other than with reference to the Marxist derived labour theory of value that is time billing.
The VeraSage Institute founder (and LinkedIn Influencer) Ron Baker and fellow VeraSage Senior Fellow Ed Kless host the popular weekly iTunes radio show ‘The Soul of Enterprise’ – see - https://itunes.apple.com/au/podcast/soul-enterprise-business-in/id893874169?mt=2
Together with 2 leading Australian based members of the VeraSage community John Chisholm (see - https://www.linkedin.com/in/chisholmjohn) and David Wells (see - https://www.linkedin.com/in/david-wells-a27a2011) I was fortunate enough to appear on the show, exploring the excellent Richard and Daniel Susskind book from 2015 ‘The Future of the Professions’ – see - http://www.amazon.com/The-Future-Professions-Technology-Transform-ebook/dp/B010N9QJ5M.
A link to the podcast is as follows –
https://itunes.apple.com/au/podcast/soul-enterprise-business-in/id893874169?mt=2#episodeGuid=http%3A%2F%2Fcdn.voiceamerica.com%2Fbusiness%2F011449%2Fbaker021916.mp3%2F90565.
We began the journey to address many of the challenges the Susskind’s have identified over 10 years ago. For many, the journey has started more recently and we believe it important to share our learnings. Our upcoming roadshow (see - http://viewlegal.com.au/roadshow-interest/) is another example of this.
The Soul of Enterprise interview explores many aspects of the book, including:
1. The likely impending end of ‘The Grand Bargain’ – meaning the monopolistic markets enjoyed by the professions will cease to exist;
2. The absurdity of the incumbent time billing business model in the new normal;
3. Technology and its re-writing of the rules of the professional services game;
4. How the ‘AI Fallacy’ lulls professionals into inertia – meaning that whether artificial intelligence performs human tasks better than humans is irrelevant; the only question is ‘does the job get done’;
5. What’s next and what’s now for professional service firms – by starting at the start and choosing a business model that sells value; not hours chalked up.