Best Practices for Legal Education

Following on some recent discussions about disruption and legal education, I’d like to solicit help from the community in determining what are the “jobs to be done” in legal education?

HBS Professor Clay Christensen tells us that a central place to begin an analysis of disruptive innovation is with the question: What jobs do our customers want us to do for them? In other words, what needs arise in our customers lives that they look to us to meet/satisfy?  Here is a relevant article: http://www.forbes.com/sites/stephenwunker/2012/02/07/six-steps-to-put-christensens-jobs-to-be-done-theory-into-practice/

I think that once the legal academy gets a good handle on this question, it may help us figure out how to reform legal education in light of the recent dramatic changes in market conditions.

I am still forming my ideas on this, so am looking to start a discussion and for feedback.  The more I think about it, we actually may have to address two questions, one focused on law school applicants and the second on law school students.  Or maybe the law school student questions are a sub-category of the overarching law school applicant questions.  That still needs to be fleshed out.

Here is my draft list of jobs that applicants to law school need to be done (in no special order and some may not apply to every student):

• I need something respectable to do after college
• I need to feel good about myself (to feel smart, special, elite)
• I need a place where I can enjoy spending time with my friends/people who share the same ideas/talents/perspectives as I do
• I need to become qualified to sit for a bar exam/ to become an entry level lawyer
• I need to feel part of a larger community/network
• I need to figure out how to use my gifts/talents for a fulfilling career (I am not a math, science type, so medical school, computer science, engineering, are not for me)
• I need to find a career that will enable the lifestyle I anticipate for myself and my family

Each of the above needs has sub-needs.  For example: “I need to become qualified for the bar/ to become an entry level lawyer” has lots of sub-needs, such as:

• I need to learn how to think like a lawyer
• I need to learn fundamental legal concepts and theories
• I need to learn the laws and legal theories that are relevant to my field of interest
• I need to begin for form a professional identity
• I need to learn the practical skills and professional values of lawyering
• I need to learn how to conduct legal research
• I need to learn how to write like a lawyer . . .
• I need to find a job in my field
• I need to begin to meet lawyers in the community in which I will work

I realize that many students may not independently identify these are needs.  What does that mean for the “jobs to be done” analysis?  Is education different in the sense that professional students may not always know their needs?  I’d also like guidance on how that is handled in the analysis.

Thanks in advance for any guidance, suggestions, comments, corrections, etc.  I hope that this sparks a fruitful discussion and look forward to hearing your feedback.

Filed under: Best Practices & Curriculum, Catalysts For Change | Tagged: Clayton Christensen, disruption, jobs to be done, law school, law students, legal education, Pistone, reforming legal education |