Litig has a very experienced and diverse Board who have spent many years working in Legal IT and other technology industries. The Board comprises both technologists and lawyers and is re-elected annually at the Litig AGM which is normally held around February. We always welcome new suggestions for Board members.
The current Board comprises:
Chairman: Derek Southall
Founder and CEO
Hyperscale Group Limited
20-22 Wenlock Road
London, N1 7GU
www.hyperscalegroup.com
Derek Southall, is a high profile and very well connected figure in the legal technology, innovation and digital marketplaces and was recently described as the “Doyen of legal IT and Innovation”. Derek was one of the founder members of Litig and has served on its Board since it was incorporated.
Derek spent nearly 25 years in a range of leading strategic roles for GowlingWLG for most of this time as a Partner and Head of Strategic Development. Derek started his professional life as a corporate lawyer but since 1999 he has immersed himself in the world of Technology and Productivity, Digital, Innovation, Strategy and Knowledge Management as well as organisational and market change.
In April 2017 Derek set up www.hyperscalegroup.com of which he is Chief Executive. Hyperscale Group delivers a range of services in relation to Innovation, Digital, Futures, Strategy, Operational Excellence and more. The company works for corporates, in house legal teams, software companies, venture capitalists, SMEs, start-ups, law firms and other professional services businesses. The purpose of the company is to help businesses to maximise their potential in an increasingly digitised and complex world.
The Financial Times ranked Derek as one of the top three most innovative lawyers in the UK in their first study into the UK market and has been awarded an Acritas Star on several occasions for delivering outstanding service.
Derek is also a co-founder of www.theprofessionalalternative.com, a NED of Fliplet and a member of the Advisory Board for the Institute for Global Innovation
Secretary: Peter Owen
Owner
Lights-On-Consulting Limited
55 Kineton Green Road
Solihull
West Midlands, B92 7DX
www.lights-on-consulting.com
Peter is the Founder and Managing Director of Lights-On Consulting Limited, an IT and management consultancy practice. Established in 2005, Lights-On specialises in the legal sector but also carries out some work for sectors outside of legal to maintain a broader commercial view. Peter is also a founder member, Director and Secretary of Litig, a not-for-profit legal think-tank whose members are senior legal IT Directors or in house legal counsel of major corporates with a goal of improving collaboration between clients and law firms. In his role as Director of Lights-On Consulting, Peter works with both Law firms and IT suppliers in the Legal sector.
Prior to Lights-On Consulting Peter was the IT Director at Eversheds for over 10 years. Eversheds was then one of the largest law firms in the world with over 4000 staff in its 13 offices in Europe and more in its many associated offices worldwide. Peter led Eversheds’ IT through its merger of seven separate law firms in August 2000, bringing together the seven IT departments with different IT systems, technologies and cultures into one, firm-wide IT department with consolidated technology across the firm.
Before Eversheds, Peter spent 9 years in DuPont primarily in the oil and gas sector in areas such as mainframe development, establishing helpdesks, managing development and business analyst teams, “Business IT Troubleshooter” and as IT consultant to various smaller subsidiary, joint venture, start-up or affiliated firms in the chemical, energy and energy conservation sectors.
Treasurer and Membership: Rosemary Kind
Warwickshire
www.rjkind.com
Rosemary has been a director of Litig since the outset. A Chartered Accountant and former IT & Finance Director of Shoosmiths, Rosemary left to set up her own publishing business Alfie Dog Fiction. Although she maintains her commitment to the Legal IT market, her main focus is now writing and publishing both fiction and non-fiction. Her first published book was Negotiation Skills for Lawyers, published by Arc Group. Since then she has added a number of novels, humorous books and non-fiction guides to her credit. Her main hobby is developing the Entlebucher Mountain Dog breed.
Prior to working in the legal industry she had ten years’ experience in senior management roles in regional newspapers, radio, and media consultancy covering both finance and IT.
Director: John Craske
Director of Innovation
CMS Cameron McKenna Nabarro Olswang LLP
Saltire Court
20 Castle Terrace
Edinburgh
https://cms.law/en/gbr/
John has been a LITIG member for more than 15 years and has been on the LITIG board for approximately 10 years.
At CMS, John is responsible for the innovation strategy, with the aim of helping CMS’s clients and business work smarter. John leads CMS’s dynamic Innovation, Legal Operations and Project Management, Legal Tech and Managed Legal Services teams. He is passionate about fostering a culture of innovation and encouraging people to be curious, ask questions and experiment.
John regularly works with clients (and others in the legal industry) to advise on innovation and to solve practical business problems. He loves hearing about specific legal and business challenges clients have, to try and solve them!
John’s extensive management experience includes business strategy & change, service design, project management, recruiting and managing large teams, process mapping and improvement, resource management and work allocation, supporting business teams with advice and guidance on selecting, setting up and driving adoption of tech tools to improve efficiency, outsourcing and insourcing IT and legal services, managing/negotiating with suppliers, dealing with compliance and risk issues (including information security) and managing large budgets.
Director: Abby Ewen
IT Director
Browne Jacobson
6 Bevis Marks
London EC3A 7BA
www.brownejacobson.com
Abby has been Technology and Operations Director at Browne Jacobson since September 2019. Prior to this she spent six and a half years as IT Director at BLM, 10 years at Simmons & Simmons, where she was Director of Business Transformation, and 10 years at Withers. Abby is responsible for aligning technology change across the firm in a strategic way, providing technology solutions and innovations for internal and external clients. Abby has a passion for business change and a desire to inspire this passion in others. Abby has a talent for reengineering roles, reshaping resources to satisfy new initiatives, and has the ability to see how the market is changing and how the business needs to change to be more effective and meet new demands. Technology plays a key part in the success of the firm. She is also a STEM Ambassador and is focused on encouraging school children to take up careers in the exciting and evolving world of technology. Abby is a regular speaker at events and contributes to a number of legal and technology publications. Abby is a Director of LITIG, the Legal IT Innovators Group and a founder member of DELTAS, promoting Diversity and Ethics in Legal Technology and Security.
Director: Stuart Whittle
Chief Technology and Innovation Officer
Weightmans LLP
100 Old Hall Street
Liverpool, L3 9QJ
www.weightmans.com
Stuart is a qualified lawyer by trade, having practiced law as a professional indemnity lawyer from 1995. He has been a partner at Weightmans since 2002. During 2003, Stuart become involved in Weightmans’ IT, designing, developing and rolling out case management systems across the firm. In 2005 Stuart took on responsibility for Weightmans’ IT department and in 2010 was promoted to IS and Operations Director since when he has been a member of Weightmans’ Board. From 2017 as part of Weightmans’ Reorganising for Profit strategic transformation initiative, Stuart took on the role as Business Services and Innovation Director with responsibility for Information Management and Technology, People and Knowledge, Business Process Re-engineering, Risk and Compliance, Facilities and Innovation. Most recently, Stuart has taken on a new role in Weightmans as Chief Technology and Innovation Officer taking on responsibility for its new product and innovation functions in addition to Information Systems, Business Change and Data Services.
Stuart regularly presents at events with special areas of interest being around BPR and helping lawyers to work smartly in an uncertain market where there is continuous downward pressure on price, upwards pressure on costs and the quality of the service that is delivered to the client needs to be continually improved. He is a certified Lean Six Sigma Master Black Belt and is currently responsible for a partner-led team who are rolling out Lean Six Sigma projects within Weightmans to enable its lawyers to deliver value to their clients cost effectively.
Director: David Wood
Productised Services Consultant Simmons Wavelength Citypoint 1 Ropemaker Street London, EC2Y 9SS www.Simmons-Simmons.com
David is part of the Simmons Wavelength team working with the firm and clients to combine technical and legal expertise, data, systems and process to produce valued services. He has more than 25 years’ experience in the legal industry with a focus on providing excellent client service and using technology in its widest sense to help law firms gain competitive advantage. This stems from his work experience and having degrees in both Computer Science and Law, being qualified as a solicitor in Scotland and obtaining an Executive MBA to develop better business insight.
Previous roles include Product Services Consultant at Allen & Overy, Global IT Director at Watson Farley & Williams (WFW), and Head of Business Projects at Berwin Leighton Paisner. For David, IT should strike a balance between providing stable, reliable systems for the business and working on innovative solutions with the business and its clients. He recognises improvements in service can be found by working smarter with existing tools; introducing new solutions which are already available in the market; and looking to emerging technologies. David pursues this at work and also promotes it as a Director of LITIG and when speaking at or contributing to legal and technology events.
Director: Lauren Edwards
Head of Business Systems
RPC LLP
Tower Bridge House, St Katharine’s Way
London, E1W 1AA
www.rpc.co.uk
With over 17 years' experience in legal IT, working at Gowling WLG and RPC, Lauren is a strategic planner with strong organisational skills and a demonstrable ability to meet demanding targets and objectives with proven experience in enterprise applications and project management.
A highly focused head of business systems, Lauren has been delivering application changes involving finance systems, legal and business applications, and legal technology throughout her time in legal. She has experience of delivering change initiatives successfully within firms, supported by her ability to build and maintain long-standing relationships with internal and external suppliers. Working closely with others, Lauren has developed and used her effective organisational and problem-solving skills to develop and support legal IT strategies. An important part of her role involves communication skills and an ability to communicate clearly and effectively to the appropriate audience has supported this to ensure the execution of change for applications is well planned, well executed and well received
She has supported her experience with formal qualifications such as Prince 2 Project Management, Agile Project Management and Managing Successful Programmes and continues to support initiatives promoting gender equality within the workplace and social mobility which has included mentoring in schools.
Director: Anthony Stables
CIO
Forsters LLP
31 Hill Street
London, W1J 5LS
www.forsters.co.uk
Anthony directs the strategy and operations for Forsters IT environment. He has over 20 years of experience leading IT functions, in multiple sectors, globally.
As well as achieving success in other firms, Anthony has also worked in financial services and retail sectors. Anthony has led several complete IT transformations and many projects internationally, making dramatic cost savings and delivering commercial advantages.
Anthony has reinvented IT at Forsters with a "Cloud first" strategy, moving the firm's systems into Microsoft's online environment and leveraging other cloud-based services. Such has been the rapid change in IT at the firm, Forsters were finalists in the Legal IT Team of the Year awards in 2020.
Well known in the IT community for his strategic vision and focus on value, Anthony works with both partners and internal staff, as well as clients, to achieve their strategic objectives.
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Director - Mel Smith
Chief Information Officer Buckles Solicitors LLP
101 Bourges Boulevard
Peterborough, PE1 1NG
buckles-law.co.uk
Mel is CIO for Buckles Solicitors LLP and has over 15 years of experience working in the legal technology industry. She has a proven track record of successfully leading large-scale IT initiatives and implementing innovative solutions to drive business growth/transformation. She has a strong background in IT strategy, change management, digital transformation, and project management. As part of her role, she acts as Head of the IT, Data, Project, Facilities and Client Onboarding departments.
She serves on Buckles Operations Board, Learning & Development Board, ESG Group, and Environmental Committee. In addition, she acts as Chair of the Innovation Committee.
She holds the designation of Chartered Professional Member (CITP MBCS) at BCS, The Chartered Institute for IT, and is a certified Mental Health First Aider by MHFA England.
Director - Sarah Ainslie
Head of IT Hill Dickinson LLP
No1. St. Paul’s Square
Liverpool, L3 9SJ
Sarah Ainslie has had a successful career spanning over 30 years in Operations, Legal and IT. She has implemented tools and technology to optimize operational efficiencies and led various projects in the insurance and legal industries resulting in significant gains. Currently, as Head of IT at Hill Dickinson, Sarah leads a team of 60+ supporting a comprehensive project portfolio, introducing new technology, and implementing Lean Six Sigma Process Improvement. Recent projects include migration to the Cloud, various Cyber Security projects and Enterprise applications. Sarah specialises in Change Management, Programme Management (PMO) and the project lifecycle from ideation to implementation. Sarah’s passion is evolving change, working smarter and helping others see the benefits of investing in process improvement and automation. Solving business problems with innovative solutions is the environment she thrives in and is excited to see the legal industry start to embrace and expect it.
Prior roles included work in the Telecomms industry managing large call centres and a transition into Property and Casualty Insurance. Sarah has held numerous roles including managing onsite development and offshore QA resource, Release Management, Business Analysis, Project and Product Management.
Sarah completed her undergraduate degree in Psychology at California State University, Sacramento and earned an MBA from University of Liverpool. She holds several professional designations including MoP (Management of Portfolios), Black Belt trained, and SCRUM Master.
Director - Russell Edwards
IT Director Birketts LLP
22 Station Road
Cambridge, CB1 2JD
Russell Edwards is a seasoned IT professional with extensive experience in developing strategic solutions and leading technology teams across various sectors. Since joining Birketts as IT Director in 2022, he has driven the firm’s technology and data strategies, aligning them with broader business objectives. Under his leadership, Russell has built a dynamic and diverse technology team dedicated to delivering top-tier services and solutions that enhance Birketts’ capabilities and client offerings.
Before Birketts, Russell managed a comprehensive technology portfolio for Mercedes AMG High Performance Powertrains for nearly a decade, overseeing technology for Formula 1, where the team secured eight constructors' world championships, Formula E, and the Project One hypercar. These achievements highlight his ability to tackle complex technological challenges and drive high-performance outcomes.
Passionate about innovation, Russell has fostered a culture of innovation at Birketts, modernising core systems and developing client-facing applications to enhance the firm’s digital capabilities. Dedicated to digital transformation in the legal sector, Russell believes that embracing digital innovation is crucial for the future of legal services and is committed to supporting LITIG to drive this agenda forward.