LawNext Episode 53: Longtime Orrick Chair Ralph Baxter on Innovating Law Practice

By Bob Ambrogi

Originally aired on September 16, 2019

Ralph Baxter spent nearly a quarter century as chairman and CEO of Orrick Herrington & Sutcliffe, leading its growth from a regional San Francisco law firm specializing in municipal finance to one of the world’s largest firms with offices worldwide and a diverse array of practices. Along the way, both Baxter and Orrick earned kudos for their many innovations in the delivery and pricing of legal services and the staffing and structure of the firm.

Now retired from Orrick, Baxter serves as an advisor and consultant devoted to inspiring positive transformation in the ways legal services are delivered globally. In particular, he believes that technology and process design enable legal services to be delivered better, faster and cheaper, and to be available at reasonable cost to all who need them, and his goal is to help make this happen.

Baxter is also an advisor to a number of legal organizations. He was chairman of the advisory board of the Thomson Reuters Legal Executive Institute, is on the board of directors of Intapp, and is on the legal advisory board of LegalZoom. He was previously on the boards of directors of both Lex Machina and Ravel Law prior to their acquisitions by LexisNexis.

He is a fellow and senior advisor to CodeX, the Stanford University Center for Law and Informatics, and is a member of the advisory boards of the Stanford Law School Center on the Legal Profession, the Harvard Law School Center on the Legal Profession, and the Georgetown Law School Center for the Study of the Legal Profession.

Included in 2009 in the ABA Journal’s inaugural class of Legal Rebels, Baxter was an elementary school teacher before attending law school. Last year, he ran for the U.S. House of Representatives as a Democrat from West Virginia, losing in the primary.