A View Toward the Future

• Author: Lee Rawles
• Pages: 62-66

62 || ABA JOURNAL MAY 2018

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PHOTOGRAPHY BY THE CANADIAN PRESS IMAGES/MICHAEL DESJARDINS

A View Toward the Future

ABA president-elect nominee champions

a mindset of ‘continuous improvement’

By Lee Rawles

A s structural changes are

being proposed at the ABA,

the nominees for leadership

positions will be called upon to

prepare the association to meet the

challenges of a changing legal mar-

ket and the needs of 21st-century

lawyers and clients.

For Judy Perry Martinez, the

president-elect nominee, this is not

a new addition to her portfolio. As

chair of the ABA Commission on the

Future of Legal Services, Martinez

spent two years with the group’s

members studying the legal needs

of communities; the changes to the

traditional methods of practicing

law that could be made to meet

them; and the ways in which inno-

vations and new technologies could

be used to advance the profession.

The commission’s work, initiated by

former ABA President William C.

Hubbard and completed in August

2016, led to the creation of the ABA

Center for Innovation; Martinez acts

as special adviser to the group.

“There’s a lot of very innovative

thinking by sta and volunteer

leaders alike going on right now

with regard to how we can deliver

more e ciently, e ectively and

competently both the services that

the association delivers to its mem-

bers and the services ABA members

deliver to the public,” says Martinez,

of counsel with Simon, Peragine,

Smith & Redfearn in New Orleans.

“We should always be in a mode of

continuous improvement.”

This philosophy of continuous

improvement was reinforced for

Martinez during the 12 years she

spent at Northrop Grumman, an

aerospace and defense technology

company. She retired as vice presi-

dent and chief compliance o cer in

2015 and rejoined Simon Peragine,

where she’d spent the beginning of

her career.

“The notion of ‘This is how we’ve

done it, but that doesn’t mean that

this is how we have to continue

to do it’ is one that I think is with

me every day because of my years

inside a corporation of the caliber

of Northrop Grumman,” Martinez

says.

Martinez, who was nominated

without opposition at the ABA

Midyear Meeting in Vancouver,

British Columbia, will face a vote

by the House of Delegates at the

2018 annual meeting in Chicago

this August, after which she would

become the president-elect. Robert

M. Carlson, now serving as pres-

ident-elect, will automatically

assume his one-year term as pres-

ident at the close of the annual

meeting, then pass the gavel

to Martinez after the 2019 San

Francisco annual.

The close of the 2018 annual

meeting will also mark the end of

Deborah Enix-Ross’ two-year term

as chair of the House. The nominee

to assume her position is William

R. Bay, a partner with Thompson

Coburn in St. Louis. Bay completed

a three-year term on the Board of

Governors in 2017.

He served on the Finance

Committee for two of those years,

acting as chair from 2015 to 2016.

He was also 2012-2013 chair of the

Section of Litigation. His term as

chair of the House would continue

through 2020.

There are 13 new nominees to re-

place open seats on the 44-member

Board of Governors. Their nomi-

nations were also approved at the

midyear meeting in February and

will also be voted on by the House

in August. They will serve three-

year terms. Once the Nominating

Committee has made its selections

for president-elect, chair of the

House and the Board, the nomi-

nees are virtually assured of being

elected.