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11/08/2025

Three Steps to ensure your ideas spread like wildfire

Going viral has become a metric for success in today’s age. Knowing that your work, product, comment or status has resonated with people so much that it’s spreading is akin to an epidemic has become an unusual badge of honour.

But why is that some works go viral whilst some sink into obscurity? Gladwell explored these very points in his 2000 book “The Tipping Point” to see why some ideas or trends blow up in society, whilst some fizzle out. Although written well before the social media boom it still offers many compelling ideas which are easily applicable now.

He gives three reasons for being the fundamental driving force for something catching on like the plague –

It’s who you know:

These people can be divided roughly into three groups Mavens, Connectors or Sales people
A maven is an expert in something, a connector is someone who knows an inordinate amount of people and so is a great contact to have whilst a Salesperson has the charisma and empathy to sell your product to the masses.
A connection or your message being passed through one of the above people is a sure fire way to ensure your message reaches a wider audience.

It’s making sure your message stick

Use techniques and skills to ensure that your message resonates and remains memorable with the target audience
Gladwell uses the examples of Sesame Street, Blues Clues and Skateboarding brand Airwalk to illustrate this point

It’s having the right context

A movement will catch on if it’s in the right context
“An epidemic can be reversed, and be tipped, by tinkering with smallest details of the environment”.
Humans often commit the Fundamental Attribution Error – when it comes to interpreting other people’s behaviour, we invariably make the mistake of overestimating he importance of fundamental character traits and underestimating the importance of the situation and context
In groups and organisations having a maximum number of 150 people can assist in messages and philosophies being passed along efficiently. More than this then bloat and inefficiencies begin to appear.

There you have it. Three ways to maximise your presence in the world.

06/08/2025

Stop Letting AI think for you

We are becoming more and more lazy.

The modern world and its technological enablement now funnels humans down the path of least resistance.

Hungry? No need to even leave your home, just take your phone out and get food delivered straight to your place.

Bored and want to play a game or watch something? There are countless different choices available via online streaming platforms or their sister sites on gaming ones. You don’t have to leave your couch or even get up to enter a disc or DVD (remember those?).

Need a lift? You can Uber from anywhere on the planet. Even working out has become easier as you can literally do so using a personal trainer from an online source.

“The purpose of Modern technology is to provide remedies for time consuming tasks in order to free up time for us to focus on more pressing matters” is the standard line about technology. But there is a downside to the constant reliance on technology according to recent studies – as humans we are losing the ability to think for ourselves.

A recent article from The Economist (published 19th July) “Does AI make you stupid” explored these ideas in further detail and came to some interesting and thought provoking results which I will explore further down below.

“AI stops us from using the Creative parts of the brain”

Human creativity has always been the fount of development and change in the modern world. Human creativity, whether in Science or the Arts, has always been the way we have manifested our inner thoughts and desires in order to recreate and advance society around us. It is this unique ability, without sounding too pompous, which seperates us from other animals. Even in industries not typically associated with creative endeavours such as Law, there is also a need for creativity and for thinking outside the box. Recent results have shown however, AI is stopping human creativity from flourishing as people become far more reliant on it. Human creative impulses are at a grave risk through over reliance on AI – what makes us human and our unique comprehension of the world is now being filtered through artificial software.

We are losing our ability to think in ways which makes us uniquely human and draws upon those elements of human experience which have proved so potent in the past. In a recent study at the University of Toronto participants were asked to provide imaginative solutions for a pair of trousers and then vs what AI could muster. Those with no access to AI came up with far more interesting and creative ideas than their counterparts who decided to use AI instead. This highlights how human thought is more open minded and creative than the thinking patterns of AI and what it can muster.

“Participants who made more use of AI scored lower across the board.”

Another interesting point is that individuals who are prone too often to using AI are now at a detriment when it comes to thinking critically. Students were asked at a Swiss Business school to answer a critical thinking assessment. The ones who said that in their own time they used AI most often and trusted it scored less than those who didn’t use it as much. The ability to critically analyse information is a vital aspect of human thinking and especially for those in the legal world. Analysing documents, extracting key information, writing reports, informational emails and other pieces form the bedrock of legal work. Individuals who are unable to participate in these thinking processes are at a major detriment.

“Cognitive Offloading and cognitive miserliness”

One of the main arguments in favour of AI is that it encourages us to free up time-consuming tasks in favour of more important ones. We can cognitively offload those tasks which are taking up too much space in our brains. There is one thing – offloading those daily, mindless tasks which take up space, but what about those tasks which require brainpower and intellectual force? As humans become more keen on offloading these basic tasks, offloading more complicated tasks which require more complicated thinking is going to become a more attractive proposition. This desire to offload more than just the routine is known as cognitive miserliness. If we can offload the mundane, then why not just offload the complex problems too? Why bother with all the intellectual exertion if AI can do it for us even better than we could do ourselves?

Again, for young lawyers, where law is an intellectually demanding profession and requires a great deal of brain power what are we doing if we are not allowing them to think, cogitate and develop themselves? Overreliance on AI could create a workforce unable to think for themselves and imagine a worst-case scenario if AI systems are taken offline – will we be well equipped enough to think for ourselves?

There are a few suggestions proposed in order to stop this overreliance on AI. Microsoft are turning to AI assistants which uses “provocations” to encourage further thinking whilst some world leading universities have proposed having chatbots to serve in the capacity of thinking assistants who ask you deeper questions instead of providing outright answers. Other ways of keeping the brain fit is to instead of asking AI for final answers you should ask it a series of questions to guide you towards a final conclusion. This would mean something like asking “How should I structure my covering letter for this specific role I am writing for” during a job search instead of “Here’s my CV, write me a covering letter”.

AI has proven to be of great use to us. Indeed, it has improved the life of many and improved processes at an exceptional pace. People who have used it on a regular basis have found them to be incredibly beneficial when it came to planning, organising and executing work. But the constant reliance on these technologies is leading, potentially, to a workforce too dependent on them and unable to think and create purely for themselves.

What was once a tool created to promote efficiency is ironically leading to mental deficiency.

Legal tech insider interviews – Will Sumners – COO at Echo Legal

It’s been a long time coming, but we’re back with a bang for another episode of Legal Tech Insider interviews.

Today’s guest is Will Sumners, Chief Operating Officer at echo.legal who to date has had a compelling journey in the world of legal technology and automation.

Hi Will, thanks so much for joining me here today.

Thank you for having me, great to catch up with you!

Firstly, do you want to tell us about your current career journey to date?

I would describe myself as an accidental legal technologist. After law school I ended up working with the Ministry of Justice, when they moved their offices I had to find a new job before the rent money ran out! While searching for a training contract I came this new (to me) technology called document automation at Business Integrity (Contract Express).

I didn’t really expect this to become my career path, however I greatly enjoyed automation as a mixture of logical and linguistic challenges. It also kept me close to law firms and was helping build a network, so it didn’t feel like a divergence at the time. As time progressed I ended up being more deeply involved in management and client relationships. This opened up the much broader part of the legal tech world – helping clients build the business case, implementation, communication and resourcing.

With Thomson Reuters, I gained more responsibility for different legal tech products, but over time grew to miss the focus on delivering services and seeing projects through end to end. This motivated me to join echo and get back to the core of implementation.

Somewhere I still have a to-do list with an unchecked box against ‘training contract’.

I can see that you really cut your teeth via legal automation. What would you describe would be the key traits of someone who wishes to do well in automation?

I was hired into document automation by Richard Newton, and his approach always stuck with me – look for the puzzle solvers and the tinkerers. If you enjoy being given a logical challenge to solve, and a set of tools/limits in which to solve it, then you will do well. Usually with document automation, your end goal is a set of expected results, the outputs aren’t to be novel. Having a mind set that lets you visualise those possibilities and find ways to achieve them efficiently and reliably is a part here, but enjoying that process and the challenge of achieving them is what I think makes some people really stand out.

There is also a curiously strong correlation with cat ownership.

What have you found to be some of the major pain points of someone wishing to adopt new automation software and some of the processes you’ve uncovered to overcome this hurdle?

I’ve written and subsequently deleted a small novel in initial answer to this question. To be as brief as I can on a few core topics –

 Outlandish Demands/Expectations – So yes, it might be wonderful if that automated will could account for a client’s desire to set up a bespoke trust for their diabetic Pomeranian, but is investing that time in development going to pay off? We always focus in initial stages at what delivers the most benefit. A system that can create a good first draft for 80% of scenarios is going to be of more value, more quickly than striving for complete coverage.

 Sign off purgatory – The automation is done, testing is complete, your finger is hovering above the ‘go live’ button, but the final senior review sign off never comes. It is too easy for these projects to be constantly pushed back in favour of the perceived higher priorities. Key to avoiding this is the correct organisational commitment. The key stakeholders being integrated to the project must be involved properly, and feel ownership (and buy into the above point – a phased approach rather than perfection on first go).

 Drafting recidivism – The project launches and sees good usage, but this tails off and old drafting approaches re-emerge. Just because something is great at one point in time, doesn’t mean it will continue to be. User engagement is pivotal, there are a plethora of reasons people may disengage, and keeping close to your users is critical. Feedback can be achieved in a variety of ways, and that engagement itself can even drive usage.

Can you give us an average day in the life of a COO?

I wouldn’t say that my day is likely representative of the most here. We’re a small company that is growing fast, no one can avoid mucking in. That being said, I really love my current role and the variety it brings. I’ll invariably spend some time talking to the team about current projects, running through any challenges and upcoming work. Some time will be spent with customers checking in, and some with new potential clients talking about how we might work together. Occasionally I’ll even find time to work on something more strategic.

What do you think will be the major developments in your industry in the coming years?

What is fascinating about the legal sector is the wonderful range of ideas that arise. Further its value and criticality means that there isn’t a shortage of people willing to take risks on new technology and approaches. This makes specific prediction something for those bolder than I. Right now we’re enjoying the diversification of products on the market, they’re driving more competition and innovation. Seeing how we can use these technologies, and make them work together is rather exciting.

The growth of alternate legal service providers will likely drive a lot of change. Expanding law from its traditional routes into consulting and project management driven by new technology solutions seems to be altering the practice of law forever. It is hard to imagine a future where advice alone satisfies organisations if there is an option to be taken further. I’m not predicting the death of traditional law firms by any means, many have created their own ALSPs already or are changing how they operate, but there are a lot of new players in the market too and some casualties seem inevitable.

How do you spend your free time?

I have a 1 year old daughter, so free time is a precious resource! Cooking is my go to for relaxation in the absence of time for more time consuming past times (I write this looking wistfully at a long powered off PlayStation). Playing around in your head with a recipe, building anticipation for what you will make, heading out to get the right ingredients for a special dish are all great fun. We’ve been trying to cut down on meat consumption and learning a new swathe of vegetarian recipes has been a lot of fun. Feel free to contact me for recipes, though I expect reciprocation!