Getting customers to drive innovation is a common theme these days. Therein may lay one barrier to legal market innovation. 

Customer-Controlled Innovation by Patrica Seybold in Optimize Magazine (Feb 07) is a good overview of how innovative companies collaborate with customers to transform their product development process.

An unstated assumption in the article is that producers and consumers differ. That’s a good assumption in most markets. But in law, at least BigLaw, what’s the difference between producers (law firms) and consumers (law departments). Not that much. Perhaps that’s one reason innovation is so slow. I can’t think of other markets where the training, personality, and work of producers and consumers is so similar.