BOOK
LEGAL UPHEAVAL: A Guide to Creativity, Collaboration, and Innovation in Law
In today’s legal marketplace, clients are demanding services that require a new skill set and a new mindset from lawyers. Borne of DeStefano’s own work leading hundreds of multidisciplinary teams on innovation cycles, as well as conducting over 100 interviews of general counsels and law firm partners, Legal Upheaval provides a new understanding of the expectations of clients. In Legal Upheaval, Professor Michele DeStefano lays out the trifecta for success in a changed legal landscape: creativity, collaboration, and innovation.
In a conversational fashion, DeStefano takes us on a journey from why lawyers need to innovate to how they can do so. She unveils the Lawyer Skills Delta and maps out a methodology for filling the gaps in current legal skill sets: The 3 Rules of Engagement and The 3-4-5 Method of Innovation for Lawyers. Full of points of reflection, as well as concrete
directions, Legal Upheaval makes innovation accessible and is the playbook for lawyers looking to create stickier and more profitable client relationships.
Praise for Book | Book Flap | Intro | TOC | Book Review | Book Review
Writing
As a professor of law, Michele researches and writes about the growing intersections between law, business, and legal innovation. Her book Legal Upheaval: A Guide to Creativity, Collaboration, and Innovation in Law leverages over 100 interviews of General Counsels of large international corporations and Heads of Innovation at law firms. Her other book, New Suits: Appetite for Disruption in the Legal World (co-curated with Dr. Guenther Dobrauz) includes chapters by experts in law, innovation, and technology to provide a global perspective on the future of legal service delivery ecosystem. Other recent scholarship focuses on role of general counsels in Digital Transformation, the importance of innovation and design thinking training to enhance diversity, equity, and inclusion in the corporate legal marketplace, and the changing role of the compliance officer and is based on interviews of over 70 general counsels and chief compliance officers of S&P 500 corporations (featured in Harvard Law School's The Practice). Additionally, she has written articles and chapters in books about innovation and entrepreneurship, collaboration and culture creation, compliance and ethics, litigation funding, the role of the general counsel and the court of public opinion, legal education, technology and law, the work product doctrine and the attorney client privilege. (Click here for a full list of articles). Michele also has two forthcoming books: Leader Upheaval: A Guide to Client-Centricity, Culture-Creation, and Collaboration and The Leader Upheaval Handbook: Leading Teams on a Collaboration and Innovation Journey which will be published in Spring and Fall 2023.
Her work has been published in leading law journals and featured in a range of media including Time Magazine, the Financial Times (UK), Forbes Women, ABA Journal, National Law Journal, American Lawyer, Harvard Law Today, The National Jurist, Legal Futures (UK), Inside Counsel Magazine, Harvard Law The Practice, and Bloomberg News.







Recent PUBLICATIONS
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Leader Upheaval: A Guide to Client-Centricity, Culture Creation, and Collaboration (Forthcoming 2023 Ankerwycke ABA Publishing).
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The Leader Upheaval Handbook: Lead Teams on an Innovation & Collaboration Journey (Forthcoming 2023 Ankerwycke ABA Publishing).
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Chicken or Egg: Diversity and Innovation in the Corporate Legal Marketplace, 91 Fordham Law Review 1209 (2023).
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Don't Let the Digital Tail Wag the Transformation Dog: A Digital Transformation Roadmap for Corporate Counsel, 17 Journal of Business and Technology Law, Volume, 183 (2022).
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Michele DeStefano's Inspirational Ideas for Leading Innovation in the legal world. (2022-05-23), IE Law School, Law Ahead Newsletter.
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Legal Levers in a Virtual World: Teaming Online to Do Different Things Differently, International Bar Association, Law Firm Management Publication (2020-05-06).
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From Expert Lawyer to Innovative Lawyer, published @IE Insights (2019-12-17).
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Innovation: A New Key Discipline for Lawyers and Legal Education, Chapter in book, New Suits (2019).
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The Secret Sauce to Teaching Collaboration and Leadership to Lawyers: The 3-4-5 Method of Innovation, Chapter in book, New Suits (2019).
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New Suits: Appetite for Disruption in the Legal World, Stämpfli Publishing, co-curated by Guenther Dobrauz and Michele DeStefano (2019).
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The Law Firm Chief Innovation Officer: Goals, Roles, and Holes, Modern Legal Practice, (October 2018 and January 2019).
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There's Me and There's Me and There's Me: It May be Too Much, But Too Little of Me is Not Enough, Chapter in book, 50 Lessons for Women Lawyers, (March 2019).
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Legal Upheaval: A Guide to Creativity, Collaboration, and Innovation, Ankerwycke Publishing, (2018).
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Transforming lawyer-client collaboration and creating lasting change through LawWithoutWalls, co-authored with Erika C. Pagano, chapter in The Legal Tech Book. Reemers Publishing Services GmbH (Fall 2018).
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Client-Centered Innovation at HSF, Harvard Law School Case Study, co-authored with Nathan Cisneros and Lisa Brem (2018).
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The Chief Compliance Officer: Should There Be a New "C" in the C-Suite?, Vol. 2, No. 5 Harvard Law School's The Practice (2016).
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How Can Law Firms Innovate?, with James Batham, Iberian Law. (2015).
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Compliance and Claim Funding: Testing the Borders of Lawyers’ Monopoly and the Unauthorized Practice of Law, 82 Fordham L. Rev. 2961 (2014).
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Claim Funders and Commercial Claim Holders: A Common Interest or a Common Problem?, 63 DePaul L. Rev. 305 (2014).
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Creating a Culture of Compliance: Why Departmentalization May Not Be the Answer, 10 Hastings Bus. L.J. 71 (2014).
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NonLawyers Influencing Lawyers: Too Many Cooks in the Kitchen or Stone Soup?, 80 Fordham L. Rev. 2791 (2012).
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Hiring Teams, Firms, and Lawyers: Evidence of the Evolving Relationships in the Corporate Legal Market, with John Coates, Ashish Nanda, David Wilkins, 36 Law & Soc. Inquiry 999 (2011).
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Taking the Business Out of Work Product, 79 Fordham L. Rev. 1869 (2011).
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Advocacy in the Court of Public Opinion, Installment Two: How Far Should Corporate Attorneys Go?, 23 Geo. J. Legal Ethics 1119 (2010).
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Advocacy in the Court of Public Opinion, Installment One: Broadening the Role of Corporate Attorneys, 22 Geo. J. Legal Ethics 1259 (2009).
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The Corporate Attorney-Client Privilege: Third-Rate Doctrine for Third-Party Consultants, 62 SMU L. Rev. 727 (2009).