If we could know in 2020 what we will know in 2025 (only five foreseeable years into the future), how would we change our attitudes, actions, and the way in which we practice law, the services we offer, the clients we target, and the ways in which we choose to deliver our services? Indeed - if we could have known a year ago the events of the first three months in 2020, what might we have done to prepare? The American writer and humorist, Mark Twain, advised: "When everybody is out digging for gold, the business to be in is selling shovels!" So, what foreseeable trend may represent the figurative "shovel" that every client will need tomorrow?

The COVID-19 pandemic has undoubtedly had a seismic and lasting impact on how the business of law is conducted. Whilst 2020 certainly expedited changes that were already trending - flexible work schedules, fully-remote offices, revised resource allocations, new client expectations - it also forced firms to adopt practices, methodologies, and strategies that pre-COVID they insisted they could not. These changes are not only here to stay but have become the expectation. Law firm attorneys, staff, and indeed clients are no longer interested in a traditional office, nor the practices that typically occurred within them. The modern law firm needs to evolve with both employee and consumer expectations in order to stay abreast with the post-pandemic world. The Post-Pandemic Law Firm looks at how law firms can make a paradigm shift, adopting an entirely new business model that focuses on providing outcomes, outputs, and results to their clients and internally places the wellbeing of their team as a cornerstone to the future long-term success and sustainability of the legal profession. Chapters include changes to business models, virtual and remote working, how the pandemic has affected women in the profession, the future of dispute resolution, M&A activity and changes to pricing models - all authored by highly respected practitioners in the modern legal system. For those law firms leaders and lawyers that realize a 'return to normal' is exactly the wrong approach, there is an opportunity to create a brighter future where work-life balance, market innovation, and smart use of technology will define the law firm of the future.