Remaking News of the Week: The law firm as a platform

I’ve based Remaking News of the Week: The law firm as a platform on a post by occasional Dialogue contributor, Ross Dawson’s report on his recent keynote address on Technology Leadership in an Accelerating World at the Oracle Impact conference in Bangkok, Thailand. I’m reporting Ross’ observations in Remaking News of the Week because these ideas from other industries are so relevant to BigLaw firms.

 Platform strategy is at the core of much of Ross’ work. he writes “while platforms are becoming much discussed by boards and executives, the key issue they need to understand is that in a network economy, platform concepts are not just about business strategy, but highly relevant to many different inter-linked domains: business models, technology development, talent structures, marketing, organizational communication, and more.” 

“One of the elements at the heart of any successful platform is ‘open infrastructure’ – the means by which people or organizations can link in to the platform and participate in the value-creation ecosystem. This requires careful design, including technologies that enable external information flows while maintaining security, and making it easy for customers, suppliers, partners or others to use the system and if appropriate integrate into their own information systems. The concept of company-as-platform is often aligned with the concept of the ‘API-enabled enterprise’.

Technology-enabled business models

While there are many manifestations of ‘company as a platform’ in business models and beyond, almost all of these are enabled by technology, in providing an open infrastructure that allows participants to connect and create value. As such technology leaders and business leaders need to work closely together to frame what is possible, build relevant governance structures from the outset, and implement platforms that are technology-enabled, but ultimately structures for value creation within and beyond the enterprise.

Read Ross’ full post here.

Company as a platform: a key concept for technology-enabled strategy