Changes to the legal market over the past year carry significant risks for law firms that fail to adapt, according to a new study on the state of the industry as firms head into 2020.

The report, issued by the Center on Ethics and the Legal Profession at Georgetown University Law Center, Thomson Reuters' Legal Executive Institute and Peer Monitor, said key trends include the changing role of clients, the emergence of non-law firm legal competition and law firm innovation in response to those shifts.

In the dozen years since the Great Recession, the report said, clients have taken "decisive" control of the legal market: Instead of deferring to outside law firms, they're now recruiting more competitively for outside counsel and requiring law firms to operate more cost effectively and accountably, with stricter budgeting and billing.