The hottest Professional Services Substack posts right now

AI adoption in legal work is accelerating fast as big AI players ship vertical skills and plugins that target legal workflows.
AI acts as a deflationary force for professional services, especially work priced by billable hours, and can hit services harder than traditional software.
AI won’t instantly replace trained lawyers because of liability and regulatory nuance, but it empowers others to do more work faster — often displacing value through “another person using AI.”

AI is driving short-term demand for consulting work and firms are adopting AI internally to boost their margins.
Despite that tailwind, weak guidance and management comments suggest AI could flip into a headwind and growth may decelerate into 2027 as services get commoditized.
The bullish trade on consulting has underperformed so far, so investors should closely watch guidance, margin improvements, and whether firms can avoid seat compression before assuming lasting gains.

The 1970s movie 'Carry On At Your Convenience' offers an interesting but awful look at British class politics and industrial relations.
British industry problems in the film reflect real issues of sclerotic management, militant unions, lack of communication, and reliance on hard currency export markets.
The British miscellaneous professional services sector may have stemmed from individual solutions to underlying institutional problems.

Routine, language-driven legal tasks are likely to be automated, so junior and mid-level lawyer roles will shrink while partners and senior lawyers who provide judgment, sales, accountability and human interaction stay essential.
Firms will become more top-heavy and need far fewer junior hires, which will reduce demand for law graduates—especially from second- and third-tier programs—and increase competition for the remaining positions.
This is part of a wider knowledge revolution: AI will replace much routine knowledge work across industries, reshaping labour markets and the economy in a way comparable to the industrial revolution.

The bento box represents how industry structure is shaped by constraints, like portion sizes and workflows that ensure efficiency.
In professional services, workflows are built around human limitations, and these constraints impact everything from regulation to business models.
AI is changing these constraints by enabling faster analysis and continuous evaluation, which will reshape industry architecture and the nature of work.

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The Great Fire of London in 1666 presented a unique opportunity to reimagine and optimize the city but ultimately, London was rebuilt exactly as it was, showing how persistent and resilient systems can be.
Complex adaptive systems, like cities, operate on different time scales with layers such as nature, culture, governance, infrastructure, commerce, and fashion, each dependent on the layers below.
Lasting change in a complex system requires either a new shock it has not yet experienced or a transformative opportunity that existing layers cannot exploit, showing the need to understand the depth at which change must occur.

AI is likely to disrupt white collar workers more than the working class for the first time.
AI excels at replacing repetitive, language-heavy tasks, starting with law but expanding to other fields.
Professional service fees may decrease as AI tools become essential, leading to challenges in finding future leaders in those industries.

SaaS companies are changing how they think about professional services, especially with AI automating tasks. Good onboarding and support can make a big difference in customer satisfaction.
It’s helpful to clearly define the scope and access to these services. Different customers might need different levels of support, so offering choices can increase satisfaction.
Pricing professional services can be tricky. Companies are finding success with tiered packages, bundling support with subscriptions, or charging a flat fee. Finding the right pricing model can drive growth.

Madoff ran a Ponzi scheme by using money from new investors to pay returns to older ones. This scheme only worked as long as new money kept coming in.
Investors should not just focus on how much money was made, but also understand how those returns were achieved. It's important to know the strategy and risks involved.
Asking the right questions about an investment helps spot problems. Madoff had no clear investment strategy, which should have raised red flags for investors.