Washington, D.C.-based privacy and communications partner Mark Brennan has big goals for what he wants to accomplish as Hogan Lovells' next lead innovation partner.

But before landing on specifics, his plan is to do some listening first.

After the firm announced Monday that Brennan would be succeeding Harriet Pearson in the role, he emphasized that his immediate goal for the remainder of 2019 is to determine what "innovation" means to the firm's clients.

"Too many firms make too many assumptions about what their clients want," Brennan said. "For that matter, too many make assumptions about what their employees want."

While Hogan Lovells already receives considerable data from its clients about their needs, according to Brennan, when it comes to the subject of innovation, it's not clear that everyone agrees on a definition.

"Innovation was and continues to be a buzzword," he said. "Context matters and people aren't necessarily articulating the same thing."

While roughly two-thirds of the time, his interlocutors on the in-house side are taking innovation and immediately connecting it to technology, another one-third of the time, they are linking it to other areas, like a firm's creative approach, diversity and inclusion efforts, talent management processes, or its ethical offerings.

That reality means that the first goal for Brennan—whose clients include online and e-commerce companies, wireless carriers and global telecommunications providers—is to establish a baseline. Bigger initiatives will follow in 2020, on the heels of the programs instituted by Pearson, whose contributions include the launch of a number of non-legal consulting services under the umbrella HL Solutions.

But part of the approach will involve talking up the firm's success stories when it comes to partners and teams delivering services in new ways.

"Clients will be telling us about what they liked, and we'll be sharing it with the market," Brennan said.

It also means building platforms internally for attorneys and staff to express their innovative ideas—and not just individuals in practices connected to the tech industry. Brennan said that he's already reached out to all of the firm's practice areas to ask leaders to consider concrete ways of incorporating innovation into their attorneys' mindsets as they develop their strategic plans for 2020.

Brennan also wants to build real-time communication in the firm across regions, time zones and practices, via both person-to-person contacts or technology-enabled discussions.

"We want to push the idea that innovation is not a task but a mindset and something to integrate into all aspects of our practice and our work with our clients," he said.

Brennan also emphasized that Hogan Lovells' model of going to the market organized around industry sectors, developed by CEO Steve Immelt, is another key example of innovation in action.

"Mark will lead the way in galvanizing our ideas, energy, and creativity around innovation," Immelt added in a statement. "Hogan Lovells has built a highly distinctive reputation for its innovative thinking around client work and Mark has the passion, knowledge and experience needed to drive us forward in a way that is visible to our people and to the market."

Brennan has also been active in many of the firm's diversity initiatives, and also leads the firm's U.S. LGBT+ affinity group and is a co-chair of its global Pride+ LGBT+ ally network.

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