Ronald J. Schutz, Robins Kaplan LLP

Partner; Immediate Past Chairman 

What are the biggest challenges you currently see in business litigation?

How to incorporate AI into the practice. AI will cause significant upheaval across the legal landscape, including business litigation. Clients will use AI tools to bring certain tasks in-house, including document gathering and management and analysis as part of the litigation discovery process. Law firms will also incorporate AI into their cases. This will result in the need for fewer younger lawyers. This will upend the leverage model that is the economic lifeblood of many large law firms. The need for fewer younger lawyers raises a very significant question: Where will the next generation of trial lawyers come from. The pool of potential future trial lawyers will shrink.

What are the biggest misconceptions about the field of business litigation?

Perhaps not the biggest misconception, but the idea that a lawsuit will solve problems often causes disappointment.

Without revealing the names of a client, what is the most interesting case you’ve worked on lately?

A business dispute between a founder and her financial backers. We represented the founder and won but unfortunately the business had been irreparably damaged.

How do you manage work/life balance?

Over most of my career the balance was far more work than life. A national high stakes litigation practice is frequently a roadblock to work/life balance.

What is one thing you would change about Minnesota if you could?

Better leadership from our top government officials in combating crime and fraud.

What’s something most people don’t know about you?

That I married my high school sweetheart, and that I’ve done a solo sky dive.