Editor's letter: Is innovation relative?

"What has been will be again, what has been done will be done again; there is ?nothing new under the sun." (Ecclesiastes 1:9)

As far back as 935 B.C - when the above biblical maxim is said to have first been penned - there was a sense that there was nothing original left to be said or done. This thinking was echoed by English playwright William Shakespeare in Sonnet 59 at the turn of the 17th century. It was later picked up by authors such as Herman Melville in Moby Dick and, more recently, postmodernist philosophers like Jean Baudrillard.

But, does the concept that there is nothing new to do apply to innovation? And, are all efforts at innovation in the competitive legal market therefore ultimately futile? A consideration of the level of technological change over the years and how the market has responded to recent 'innovations' would seem to indicate a resounding 'no' to both questions.

Lawyers in King Solomon's, Shakespeare's or Melville's time certainly did not have ?the benefit of practice management systems, collaborative social media tools or e-discovery 'solutions' which lawyers today use as a matter of course. So, one could argue that the ?idea "there is nothing new under the sun", propounded nearly 3,000 years ago, was ?somewhat pre-emptive.

However, a closer examination of more recent technological 'innovations' would seem to indicate that these are less original than they would first appear. A photo comparison circulated on Twitter recently has highlighted how mobile phones, tablets, videoconferences, flatscreen televisions and even Google Glasses are derivative of Star Trek technologies (which, in their turn, are derivative of other technologies described in science fiction). So, from that perspective, the idea that we lack originality holds true.

But, how many people who bought a first-generation iPad complained about its lack ?of innovation? What mattered to end users was that it had the power to transform their lives. So, much in the same way, a new law firm offering can be considered innovative if that is how it is perceived by its clients - despite the fact that something similar may have been running successfully in a boutique San Francisco or Birmingham law firm since the noughties.

Several law firms' marketing managers apparently see it this way and have boisterously announced the launch of the 'first ever' product or service offering of its type to the market. Of course, firms don't live in a vacuum with their clients - especially in the age of the internet. If high-value clients learn that domestic competitor firms developed similar (and cheaper) offerings five years ago, you can guess how many will remain loyal to their current legal advisers.

The answer, then, is to ensure your firm is at the cutting-edge of innovation in the market ?- so that you are not just inadvertently or deliberately copying your competitors but developing a product or service offering which, as far as you can determine, has 'never' been launched before - at least not within the legal sector. And, if you can develop an offering that impresses your clients so much that they evangelise about it to their friends and acquaintances - much like Apple fans rave about their shiny new gadgets to Android users - you'll know that you've got a winner.

Until next time,