E123 - Mark Smolik, General Counsel, Board Member, DHL Supply Chain Americas
48:10
SUMMARY KEYWORDS
data, regard, business, people, lawyer, technology, legal, world, privacy, debbie, organization, years, dhl, claims, hear, opportunity, leverage, legal departments, insight, continue
SPEAKERS
Debbie Reynolds, Mark Smolik
Debbie Reynolds 00:00
Personal views and opinions expressed by our podcast guests are their own and are not legal advice or official statements by their organizations. Hello, my name is Debbie Reynolds; they call me "The Data Diva". This is "The Data Diva" Talks Privacy podcast, where we discuss Data Privacy issues with industry leaders around the world with information that businesses need to know now. I have a super special guest on the show today. Mark Smolick is the Chief Legal Officer of DHL Supply Chain Americas welcome.
Mark Smolik 00:39
Debbie. Thank you. And thank you so much for having me as a guest; I really do appreciate it.
Debbie Reynolds 00:45
Yeah, well, it's taken me a couple of years to get you on the show. You and I have some mutual friends together. And I know you're always a busy man. So, first of all, thank you for being on the show. Before I get you to talk more about your role and your trajectory in legal and the data space, I always like to tell people how we met, right. So we met in Washington, DC, and we were both speaking at the National Press Club for an event there. And you were the keynote speaker, I think I was a panelist on something else. And then, at some point, we were grabbed together, and they made us do like a video interview or something. So it was a mash-up. And it was great. I don't know what happened to that video interview. But it was fun. And it was fun talking with you. But one thing that I remember about your speech that you did that day is that when you started talking, nobody moved. Nobody was looking at their phone, people were not even breathing like they just cannot even believe it. And that kind of thing. In the end, you got a standing ovation or something like that. And it was so much fun. And this is the reason why I liked it so much is because you're obviously a very well-regarded attorney, you're a business person, and you're very plain-spoken. Maybe that's a Midwestern thing we have in common. But I love that about you. And I want you to definitely introduce yourself.
Mark Smolik 02:21
Well, I appreciate those comments. Thank you very much, my mother would be so proud to hear them. But candidly, you're right. There's probably a lot of Midwestern values. And especially when you go to a venue like Washington before something like the Press Club, you're standing up in front of people that you're looking at you wondering how in the world did I get the opportunity to even stand in front of some of these people whom I revere, given what they've accomplished, not just professionally, but personally, as well. But you know, like anything else, when you find something that is a topic or something that you want to talk about, especially if you can relate it to people that is near and dear to you, and that you can talk with about passion and telling the stories, people tend to listen. And that's exactly what happened. And I remember that event so vividly. And then, of course, having an opportunity to connect with you as well. So a little bit about me. I mean, you've already introduced me with regard to my legal role. I've been an attorney for now 35 years. So I've been so blessed in my career; I'll give you a little bit of an insight. I started off as an associate at a law firm with three associates and 10 partners. It was in Cleveland, Ohio. And most of the work I did, Debbie, was the work that the partners didn't want to do. But I had a bit of a unique situation because, throughout undergrad and law school, I worked in construction. And some of the guys with whom I worked in construction became clients. And they did some things, sometimes some stupid things, but ultimately they needed legal counsel. So they came to me and allowed me to build a little bit of a book of business. But something unique happened early in my tenure at the law firm. And that is an opportunity that arose for me to join the in-house counsel team at Sherwin Williams. So here I went from kind of a jack-of-all-trades young associate not knowing a lot about working in this corporate environment. I absolutely loved it. My boss was three years older than me. His boss was two years older than him. We worked for a very, very progressive General Counsel who ultimately became the CFO at Shortlands. And what was a legal team of about 18 grew from there. But I learned a lot substantively, and more important than the substance of law were some of the m&a opportunities that I got involved in. I've got to be candid with you. I had no idea how to do anything involving mergers and acquisitions when I started with the company, but I got partnered up with the Executive VP, who was head of business development. And to me, it was fascinating. And I know this is a lot about me here, but I'll stop here at a low end a little bit. Because what I learned was the people side of the relationship. He had a relatively unique name, his name was Conway Ivy, and he was my age at the time. And I'm 60 years old at this point in time. So I'm working with these young lawyers learning all this great substantive knowledge. But I'm working with a mentor who is just fascinating from a legal super leadership perspective. And I learned a lot about how to connect with people. Maybe that's somewhat of what came out in Washington. But after my stint of 13 years at Sherwin Williams, most of it outside the US, I had an opportunity to join Safelite AutoGlass, as a general counsel, and I did that I was 39 years old; I spent quite a bit of time there until we sold the company. And then I had the privilege to come to join DHL, and this is my 14th year here. So it's been an incredible ride, I started here in 2009 with five people, and we are now a team of 80. So there's been a lot of growth in the organization. And I've been so privileged to be able to surround myself with some folks who are way smarter than I am. But all who are committed, just making sure that we have an opportunity to really continue to deliver value, deliver value to the organization. So I've been talking a lot, so I'll pause.
Debbie Reynolds 06:32
Well, that's a tremendous backstory; I didn't know all that. That's amazing. I want to talk a little bit about data and how that plays in your role. So you know, now I guess, with the proliferation of technology, maybe I'm dating myself, but I remember my first jobs like there were, email didn't exist, you have to write memos about important things, or whatever. But now it's, you know, it's email; all this is electronic communication. How does that either make your job easier or complicate your role?
Mark Smolik 07:11
It's among the most exciting elements of my role, especially in my leadership position. But just for a moment, you know, I grew up. And if you really want to roll the clock back, folks, gasoline was 32 cents a gallon, I can remember a lot of the business stories that I would learn as a teenager, where oil was referred to as liquid gold. And it still is in some capacity, right? I mean, everything around the world is based on energy. But now, data is things that exist in space, things that are somewhere in these computers; data is the new gold. And when I look at it from the perspective of just our business at DHL, I mean, we live and die by data. What does this what does the operational data tell us with regard to the efficiency of any one of our warehouses under delivery, but when I look at the legal departments, and I can particularly talk about this in the context of being the former chair of the ACC law department management network, we have access to a lot of different law departments. And, of course, through my involvement, I find that a lot of legal departments continue to struggle with a couple of things. One is the traditional elements of the word legal, we provide legal advice that may very well be true. But in a department like mine, that is our core. That's the service we provide. But I've got 80 people, and I've got money that has to be generated by the business or attributed to paying those 80 people in order for me to handle things through litigation with external counsel; there's a whole business of the department. And where I think the data element and law are so relevant is what are we doing with all of the various claims, litigation, or matters that we not only have handled historically but currently handle and will continue to handle? And what story is that data telling us? How could we leverage that data in such a way to identify risk and take steps to appropriately mitigate risk? And let me give you a little bit of a story. There's a number of years ago, where I brought together a few of the leaders of my team. And I said, Look, guys, on average, in the United States alone, we have about 130 Equal Employment Opportunity Commission claims pending at any one time, and that's public knowledge. But that is year after year. And every single year, every time a new matter comes in, we open up an electronic file. We handle it, we close it, and we go to the next one. But what does 130 over just the past five years of claims tell us? What's the common element? How much does it cost us? What are we finding with regard to this jurisdiction or this venue, or what is the typical type of climate that generates the most claim costs? So typically, what we did is something a little bit rudimentary; we literally went back, and we looked at five years of data. And we said, okay, looking at all that data, here are the top 10 different parameters that came out of all of those claims. That led us to conclude that if we have a new employment claim, on average, it's going to cost us X dollars, it put us in a position of being able to use that data to go back to the business and say, look, here are the sites that are your biggest offenders. But every time you get in a new EEOC claim, you need to take X number of dollars, a little over $20,000 of revenue set aside to pay for that client. And by the way, in order to get $1 of revenue, you have to generate $30 in sales. So that $20,000 claim, it's actually $600,000 in revenue, and then allowing people to put things into perspective, and to really see the value of how you can leverage data in a very, very meaningful way. So in just closing on that comment, the law departments that are being progressive, who are really looking at their data, their claims history, just to make some informed decisions, and how they can identify and mitigate risks that are the ones that are really enhancing their value propositions to the business.
Debbie Reynolds 11:22
Yeah, that's a great story. That's a great story. I love to hear about people who are using data in the right ways. I had an author on my podcast recently, he said a very profound thing. Truth before, what do you say truth before insight? I think that was his thing. So it was like, you have to get the real data, the real accurate data before you can actually get an insight. So being able to collect that it's very important.
Mark Smolik 11:54
It's true. Yeah. Especially as we tried to leverage artificial intelligence to do legal work. And boy, we're still in the infancy there. But you can make every assumption, every presumption based on your experience of typically saying, for example, I've handled 100 of those claims. And I predict it's going to come out X, Y, and Z. Okay, it's kind of based on your experience. But what does the data actually tell you? And that's something that we continue to refine here at DHL.
Debbie Reynolds 12:29
Yeah. Wonderful. So I want to talk a little bit about people and privacy. So the thing that has happened over the last several years, as we see more privacy regulation, what it's doing is changing the way that businesses either collect data or retain it. So, for example, in the past, there weren't very many laws that said that you have to handle data a certain way unless there was some kind of statutory requirement, right? Like, okay, this type of data, you have to keep for X number of years, you know, if things didn't fall into those buckets, they're just it was kind of like a free for all. So now we're seeing these privacy laws come in and saying, hey, organizations, you can only keep your data, certain data, as long as you have a purpose for it. So tell me a little bit about that. Have you had these conversations within your organization? Or have you heard this from other people?
Mark Smolik 13:34
Particularly? Well, the answer to your first question yes, we've definitely had the conversation in our organization, particularly when it comes to the legal team supporting the HR team. And that's not just in the United States; that's in every country in which we operate, not just here in the Americas, but I also have the privilege of serving as the chair of our global legal services practice group. And it's true in every country in which we operate around the world. And I am of the opinion that the top five issues of a broad nature are in the minds of HR professionals and lawyers that support HR professionals. Privacy is surely among those top five. Absolutely. And it's one people continue to struggle with, particularly because you have jurisdictions around the world that are very different in their approach. And even if you just look at our own country, here in Europe, sure, you got separate countries, you have the EU. Here, we've got 50 Different states within one country, all of whom address privacy very differently, and some of whom aren't even ready to begin to address it at all because it's so daunting. But you know, like anything else, the guiding principles that I have been following with regard to advising our folks on privacy issues have a common theme. It's an acronym, ACO. The A stands for advise; advise the business on the core elements of what they need to be aware of. When it comes to people's privacy, data involving people is totally different when it comes to data involving entities, right? The C is consent. And it just makes sure you have full disclosure with regard to how you're going to capture the data, what you're going to use it for, and make sure you'd have a meaningful way of capturing minutes consent. And, of course, even if somebody has consented to you capturing that data on them, give them an opt-out opportunity. Now, those are three very, very general. But in particularly, it comes out of some research that my team recently did about 40 different countries around the world, supporting our HR team, particularly with regard to very sensitive information from employees. And that's kind of the theme that we have found around the world.
Debbie Reynolds 16:08
Wow, that's a great acronym; I have to use that. Right. So different jurisdictions. Regardless of where you are around the world, those themes come up, right, depending on the type of data that you're using, and things like that. I wanted your thoughts about I think there's kind of a dichotomy here, this being created. One, you probably have heard this over many years, many years ago, you know, a lot of people in legal I know, were talking about federated data, which is nothing wrong with that, but the idea of some people's hands, like, let's just keep everything forever, and then possibly, we'll get some insights from it. And then so what we have now, some of the laws and regulations that are saying, you know, don't keep everything forever, unless you have like a true purpose for it. So I feel like those are kind of competing themes in the way that data is being handled; what are your thoughts about that?
Mark Smolik 17:10
Well, there's two different schools of thought; for one, in my role at DHL, of course, I wear a legal hat. But I also wear a business hat; I happen to sit on the board of directors, as well, putting my business hat on, purely a business hat. And thinking of the data that used to be kept. Prior to everybody having email and laptops, you had data; it was either on a piece of paper, on your desk, or in a folder somewhere in a filing cabinet. All right, and you access that data and hopefully had a system in place that allowed you to retrieve that data when you needed it, and you had no ability to search it. Other than hey, I'm pretty sure I have a file on ABC, you'd go pull it, and you'd look through it, right? And some progressive companies decades ago had systems in place to purge that data largely tied to the statute of limitations associated with tax-related matters. But then the world changed over a fairly decent period of time. When file cabinets, although they may still exist, somewhere are now replaced by laptops, right and our data is everywhere. When I think of the concept of forever data as a business person, candidly, I love it. Think about a situation where you got a 20-year-old customer who says, hey, I really liked the way that we did things two or three contracts ago. And you look back and say, oh, yeah, that was 12 years ago. Yeah, sure, we can do that again, or gives you the entire history of that relationship literally at your fingertips. Right, you could even, as you know, open up if you have Outlook put a file in place for a customer, and have every single communication document you ever had associated with that customer over whatever period of time that you want so the business person in me loves it okay and to a certain extent the lawyer in me loves it too Debbie with regard to forever data. But the litigator in me hates it. You know, I can remember and kind of slipped by, but it probably was 20 years ago when Microsoft was embroiled in some god awful antitrust litigation. And some email popped up that was kind of like the end all be all for them. And I don't know enough to speak intelligently about it. So I'm recalling what I remember from headlines. But you know, that situation where, okay, that email that you never wanted anybody to discover is discoverable. You find out that it was from 15 years ago, and you wish you had a data purging mechanism in place that said anything older than x is gone. Companies are continuing to struggle with how long do we keep data. And it is a struggle that I think is going to continue for quite some time. If you go back five years ago, the cost of just keeping data in a system somewhere was such that it was pretty expensive. But now you can buy space, you're talking terabytes of space, for very insignificant amounts of money. So it's no longer as much of a cost driver as it is more of a, what I'm going to call corporate governance associated matter. The balance that I think that lawyers will always have is the desire of the folks in the business saying, I want to keep everything because I need that data to help me support my business. And a lawyer saying yes, but prudent dictates that you do not keep it for longer than x because of the risks associated with litigation. Lawyers can't control those decisions; all we can do is provide insight with regard to some of the pros and cons associated with it. There's no one size fits all; even among our own organization, we have different approaches around the world with regard to how long data is kept. And the same is true of emails; how long do you keep an email? And when does it automatically get purged from the system? Under what circumstances?
Debbie Reynolds 21:21
That's amazing. Thank you for it. I want to talk about something topical in the news, ChatGPT generative AI; I'm amused by a lot of the articles that I see, you know, about, oh, the AI is going to take over lawyers’ jobs and things like that. You are a perfect person to ask this question; well, what are your thoughts about AI, especially some of these emerging AI, tools and technologies as it infiltrates every aspect of professional life? What are your thoughts about that evolution in legal?
Mark Smolik 22:08
There haven't been a lot of evolutions, and legal at least in the three and a half decades that I've been asked in the industry. And there surely hasn't been much in the way of revolution. But in the past decade, there have surely been a lot of individuals and organizations, including me personally, that are trying to change things about how we do what we do in the delivery of our services, on the one hand and in the management of the business of law. Here's how I view artificial intelligence. It's in its infancy, you know. In a matter of two months, anybody who goes to Legal week in New York and has the opportunity to walk through the grand convention hall is going to see everything about everybody. And it's like a car lot. You get their different booths set up for different technologies, everybody's got their own little way of trying to solve the problems of the world with regard to their piece of technology. There's an awful lot of discussion and a lot of focus on leveraging AI to really focus on the lion's share of what corporate law departments do, which is drafting and negotiating contracts. And if it's not, that it has been for a number of years, and still is how to effectively deal with the discovery of documents and litigation e-discovery. And, of course, there's multiple other players out there, as well. But that technology surely has a place. And we're going to get to a place eventually where machine learning is really going to help us do a better job drafting and helping us negotiate our contracts. It will do an excellent job, helping us organize those contracts, and driving the efficiencies of drafters whether you're a contract manager or a traditional lawyer, who is drafting those contracts by readily making available to you different clauses, alternative scenarios where you can plug and play, and really help put together a more efficient approach to drafting a contract. But when it comes down to having a document with words, that you now have to negotiate, I can't see an instance where artificial intelligence is going to take the place of the back and forth with regard to the art of negotiation. And when it comes to the overall broader concept of the delivery of legal services, here's what I've learned. In my own experience. Early on in my career, it was about me. It really was. It was me working at Sherwin Williams to prove that I was the best member of the team, but I could deliver on time, but I really had thought through the issues. But the older I got, and the more I got into management, the more I got into litigation, excuse me, into leadership, the more I realized that might be the case at that phase of your career, but ultimately, it's about the we, not the me. And it is about the perception that people have of you as a lawyer, and the delivering of those services and how you interact with people. That is really what is driving the reputation of the law department. Debbie, my folks in the business never asked what technology are using. What AI are you using to leverage how to draft contracts better, because at the end of the day, all they care about, do we have a contract that appropriately balances our risks. And that is a balanced approach to dealing with our customers. That's it. So whenever I leverage technology, it's up to me. But it's not on the top of the mind of the business. And because of that, it's not just in my experience, it's like, from what I've heard from others, it's tough to go into anybody, whether it's a finance person, if it's your CFO, or your CEO, your president, say any 100 grand for a new piece of technology. And they look at you and say, hey, but would you rather have an FTE as a paralegal, or would you rather have that technology? Chances are I probably took the paralegal because I need the bodies in that regard. But it's tough to prove the ROI of technology in legal. And a lot of times when I hear people trying to justify their technology, I rarely hear what the ROI argument is. I hear about the efficiencies, I hear about this'll help you draft your contract clauses quicker, or this is a new way of doing your e-discovery. But I don't hear the ROI piece at all.
Debbie Reynolds 26:48
Yeah, I think that's a problem across many industries, where people get excited about a tool that they see, and they want it with the bells and whistles, but they can't really make a business case for it.
Mark Smolik 27:05
Yeah. And there's a bit of an art in that. And that might be a podcast for you to add another day. Some other things with regard to leveraging technology, I'm going to be the first to admit that there have been a lot of instances where I'll be on the phone with somebody, and they will be talking about something asking a question, and then something will pop into my mind. Not quite sure what the law provides on that. But I'll go out online, and I'll find the guidance that I need. And that happens several times a day, you know, you refer to as chat. Microsoft's behind it, there's an awful lot of utility. That's pretty new. But I think that that's going to be pretty significant. For just general business utility.
Debbie Reynolds 27:50
Yeah, I think it will be too. You know, I know that a lot of writers that are putting things in, you know, blogs and newspapers, they want to get eyeballs on the story. So they come up with this kind of frightening, you know, headlines like, oh, the AI is going to replace the lawyers. I don't think that's the idea. You know, I've always said I don't think there's such a thing as an evil robot is going to sort of take over lawyer and lawyer work. Because, you know, AI can't be human. And I think, you know, there are things that you learn over time as a human that AI technology can never know in the same way. Also, I do think that having these types of AI tools be able to help with the organization of information, especially those lower level tasks that are very time consuming, that details will definitely help, but I think, you know, focusing on, you know, the way that we can, you know, these tools are out there folks focusing on the best way that we can be able to leverage it, you know, within our organizations, I think is fine, as long as we know that the human is in the driver's seat.
Mark Smolik 29:12
Oh, I absolutely agree with you. And I emphatically agree. And I think this is likely even for the next generation of lawyers behind me who ultimately make their way to leadership, whether in a firm or in an organization, that artificial intelligence will not replace the human element behind the lawyer. At the end of the day, the business people with whom I have worked in my career realize they could probably Google a question and get guidance on an answer, right? But what they need is somebody to come through and sift through all of that, somebody that they trust their judgment to say, yes; theoretically, that might be your risk. But looking at all the operational disciplines that we have in place, looking at our history, looking at the current regulatory environment applicable to that issue. I don't see much of a risk. And that is where you strike the balance. And ultimately, at the end of the day, most of the business folks are looking for you to guide them to, can I do this? Or am I restricted from doing this? In most instances, there's usually a guiding to a yes, maybe with some conditions to it, as well. One of the things that I wanted to mention, particularly with regard to leveraging technologies, is that some organizations are literally finding ways to harness data to help us do what we do and legal, whether at a law firm or in a corporation, better, faster, cheaper. And one organization, particularly a very, very large publicly traded company, is developing a new mitigations insight platform that will give anybody, any lawyer who touches their system access into, imagine this. This is, I think it's pretty cool. Let's assume that you've been sued in pick the jurisdiction; let's just say San Francisco, California; let's assume it's a labor matter. And let's assume the judge is Debbie. And you go in and say, okay, I just got sued out of Debbie's court in San Francisco, California. The plaintiff's lawyer is Judy Jones, my lawyer is John Smith. And I want to know, the likelihood of the plaintiff or, excuse me, the judge, you Debbie rolling for the plaintiff and the defendant, I can tap the database, and the database is going to go out there and said, oh, yeah, Debbie said, 200 of these, and she's ruled for the plaintiff 90% of the time. And then I say, okay, well, I wanted to see the track record of the plaintiff's lawyer and how often have they succeeded in that court on these issues; it'll tell you that, and it'll tell you the success rate about your lawyer, as a defense lawyer. And if you want to, you can put in the name of other lawyers to represent you and see who might have a better track record. But it'll tell you the closest thing to a crystal ball with the likelihood of success without you spending any money on this to really incur any defense costs. Maybe the issues are such that you decide, no, I'm going to settle this right out, or I'm going to fight it. But my point is, is that there are some, we call them LSPs. Right, I'll turn it over because service providers are finding creative ways to harness data to help us and the legal side of things, whether it's the business side, or just the substance practice side, to do things better, faster, cheaper, in a way that we never would have been able to do so even just a few years ago.
Debbie Reynolds 32:42
Yeah, I think we have talked about this one, actually. Right. So this type of application of technology is actually the way you should be using technology. Because I think about technology, is it helping you do the heavy lifting, as opposed to having people turn hours trying to make these insights, trying to do things over and over, be able to gather this stuff in a way that gives you the insight or give you an idea of kind of which way to go, helps you do that data analysis without a lot of time effort on your part? That's just the perfect way to use technology.
Mark Smolik 33:21
No absolutely. Yeah, absolutely. Yeah.
Debbie Reynolds 33:25
What is happening in the world that concerns you now about privacy, like maybe a lack of Federal regulation, certain technologies that are creeping up doing things? What are your thoughts about that?
Mark Smolik 33:41
The biggest concern that I have right now is the fickleness of our US government. And it's a broader response than just with regard to data. You have an administration for eight years, they have one way of doing things, and new administration comes in and says, oh, no, no, no, that's all wrong. They're going to do their thing. And then somebody new comes in, and before you know it, you're looking at it. And from a, just looking at it from a business perspective, you're like, hey, guys, I know, none of you like each other. And you all have your own political agendas. But you have to remember that there are individuals and people that are supporting you that need guidance on a somewhat consistent basis as to how to deal with things. So, you know, when you're dealing even with governments who decide that a prior administration's perspective on data or privacy or their priorities are so radically different than the other one, that you look at it and say, can you please just give us consistent guidance on what we need to do? And when you have any administration, even in the past, we could look at it and say 24 years where there has been so much radical change, it's very, very hard to predict with any level of certainty on some of the most sensitive issues with regard to Data Privacy, Data Privacy, for example, that you can then implement on any broad basis as particularly in a company the size of DHL. So that is of concern. To other broader concerns of mine is one, China really needs to find a way to address its internal COVID-19 issue; it's been struggling for years; let's close the border, not close the border, what they continue to have a resurgence, but China is such a large part of the global economy, that until things settle down, they're a bit, it's hard for the global economy to begin to settle down. So that is obviously driving a lot of uncertainty. The other, of course, without getting into the politics behind it, is the war in Europe. No more comment than that remains a concern. But of course, the uncertainty with regard to what is going on in the global economy, there are so many radically changed political positions now than there were just globally, three, four years ago, that it's, it's a shock to the global economy. You know, DHL moves about 7%, sometimes even more than that of the world's commerce every single day. So we've got our finger pretty close to the pulse of what's going on in the global economy. And it's very, very difficult. You know, when you're dealing with fuel prices that are $1 more a gallon or two $2 more a gallon, especially when you look at the hundreds and hundreds of millions of gallons of fuel that are used every single year, we use a lot. We've got almost 500 airplanes flying around the world, every single day and trucks, and boats and ships and what have you around the world. And you put another dollar on a balance sheet, where you're burning the equivalent of 10's of millions of gallons of fuel a year; it's expensive. Now that's on a big scale. Now imagine the one-person trucking company or the salesperson just driving around town, and they're incurring additional costs. So obviously, inflation is top of mind for a lot of people, but the China situation, the war in Europe, and the uncertainty with regard to the response of how we're going to bring, get our handle around inflation, is a paramount concern of mine.
Debbie Reynolds 37:21
Yeah, those are all good. Thank you for mentioning those. I think part of the message of certainty is always a problem. Absolutely. But I think the way that business operates now, it isn't in a vacuum. So there's definitely more global tentacles on everything, right? So you can't kind of just can't shut your eyes, you're like, oh, I can't, I'm going to ignore what's happening in Russia, ignore what's happening in China. And just do my business. And now we're seeing more of that connectedness and those impacts. So I'm glad you brought that up.
Mark Smolik 38:37
Very much so. Yep.
Debbie Reynolds 38:39
Excellent. Excellent. Well, if it was the world according to you, Mark, and we did everything you said, what would be your wish for Data Privacy, legal, anything in the world, whether it be law, technology, or human things? What are your thoughts?
Mark Smolik 38:56
Well, God forbid, we did everything that I wanted to do. I mean, I'm one of many, many people who had the privilege of working in our industry and one of a select group of folks who have the privilege of being able to say they work as a general counsel, Chief Legal Officer for really any size organization. So I'm going to answer your question a little bit differently. And that's in reference to the legal industry. What I'd like to see continue to come out of our industry is a renewed but more intensive focus on the operational side of what we do and how we do what we do. We focus so much on the service side and don't get me wrong, Debbie. That is, that's our core. We sell or provide legal services. But anymore, whether you look on the variable side of a corporate legal department or you are engaging external counsel where you start with, for example, when I was associated with a law firm, was $75 an hour, where that same associate is billing $375 an hour, or partners or billing, $600, $700/hr. In some jurisdictions, $2000, you've got to look at it and say, I can't afford it. And you can't just continue to add increases year after year. So the more that we as an industry could look for ways as to how do we do things better, faster, cheaper, leveraging technology, to organize our approach to litigation, even better, perhaps through the approach that I took, I was sharing with regard to the large public company. And if you'd like insight into who that is, I'll tell you that at another time, that time, it's just not right at this moment. But we've got to leverage that technology to help us do things more efficiently because that is ultimately going to help us enhance the service offering. And for those people that are paying our legal for our legal costs, whether it's a corporation with a law firm, or the individual who's hiring an individual lawyer, ultimately, at the end of the day, we all want to see better control over the cost of providing those legal services. Technology is a tool for us to help get there. But we've got to be smart as to how we roll it out. And we have to be smart with regard to what we as purchasers of those services; ultimately, focusing our priorities on AI is great if it is used to harness, organize and leverage data to help us tell a story to identify and mitigate risk. When it comes to Data Privacy, Debbie, I'm going to be long retired. And you may be too before there is any sense of what we might call a consistency with regard to Data Privacy. European Union has been driving it for a while; that's kind of the gold standard, right? Lots of organizations and lots and lots of governments are trying to catch up with all that trying to figure out what it all means. But we're going to continue to migrate away from paper into the digital world. And, you know, I know a fraction of what is out there about me in the digital world. People tell me that you'd be shocked if you really had the opportunity to learn what is out there. And they say, and you probably be upset as to who knows, what about you on the dark web or what have you. There has to be some progressive stance, particularly with regard to what is out on the dark web and what have you; that's a call out. But one other thing I want to mention, particularly with regard to Data Privacy, and enhanced to do with social media, it's the proliferation of information that, in many regards, we all know as false. It used to be that you'd open up the newspaper or you hear it on, you hear something on the news, pretty believe it any more; you’ve got to be cautious because of the spin that is put on messages that come out of the media and in the mainstream media. But particularly with regard to social media, you know, and I'm going out on a tangent here, so forgive me, that's all right, go for it. But when the large social media platforms came to be, our US government looked at it and said, wow, look at what we can help referee with regard to the dissemination of information and the exemptions that those platforms received from the Federal government. With regard to what I'll call the truth in publishing, you know, we held we hold well-called traditional media, newspapers, and magazines accountable to certain standards, you print what's true. But yet, we have an online social media digital platform that will allow print anything, doesn't matter if it's true or not. And somehow, we've got to do a better job, particularly in our own backyard in the US, and making sure that the platforms that so many hundreds of millions of people rely on are publishing data that is factually accurate and not misleading. And in many regards, it provides a lot of abuse of private information about people and the dissemination of just downright false and misleading information. So if I had a magic wand, and I was in charge oh yeah, I change that. Here I go.
Debbie Reynolds 44:40
That's a great wish. You know, I think I think I heard someone say this, which is true. I remember growing up, you know, first of all, there wasn't that much media. So there were just a few, maybe you count on one hand the number of TV channels there was news was only on for like, you know, a couple like maybe half hour every few hours. And even though you may have chosen different channels we'll look at, they were all telling the same story. So social media, they're, you know, 1000s of channels. And they're telling totally different stories, different segments of the population. So this is quite troubling, I agree.
Mark Smolik 45:18
You know, in that traditional media years and years ago, since you opened up that door, I'll bet you right, there were just a few there were NBC and CBS, just to name a few. And they did tell the same story. And you could go between it pretty much the same story, no political banter. But there was one anchor or one news person in particular, who when he signed off, said, and that's the way it is, and it was Walter Cronkite. And lots of people who hear this will say, who's that go out and Google it, folks, and you'll see, but And you believed it? Because that's what it was. It was factually presented. Maybe we'll get back to that at some point in time. But it's going to take a forcing mechanism, like perhaps the heavy-handedness of a Federal government like the US, to say, no, you're going to publish something. You've got to verify that it's accurate before you publish all your work.
Debbie Reynolds 46:18
Thank you so much. That's amazing. It's always a pleasure for me to chat with you. And it's my honor to have you on the show. I know everyone will love the episode.
Mark Smolik 46:28
That goes both ways. Thank you. It's like I said; it's a privilege for me as well. And I can't tell you how much I value your friendship. I surely follow you on social media. I know what you put out there is factually accurate. So thank you very, very much, but it's insightful. And I really do appreciate it. So thank you for doing what you do.
Debbie Reynolds 46:49
Well, thank you so much. Well, thank you for being such a leader and such a plain-spoken person. People look up to you all over, not only in legal but in other industries as well, because I think we just need more straight talk, don't we?
Mark Smolik 47:05
Well, we do so line by line, and that's the way it is. So to borrow from Walter Cronkite.
Debbie Reynolds 47:13
Thank you so much for being on. I really appreciate your time, and I'll talk to you soon.
Mark Smolik 47:19
All right. Take care. Bye bye????
