Bryan Cave Leighton Paisner has hired Baker McKenzie’s former global chief information officer to take up the CIO role at BCLP.

Dan Surowiec joins in Chicago, bringing with him more than a decade of experience as a CIO and vast expertise in designing and delivering technology systems to support the provision of legal services. Surowiec is a renowned voice on digital transformation and emerging disruptions in the legal industry, including data strategies and the use of AI. In his role at BCLP, Surowiec will oversee the firm’s technology teams and help define the next phase of the firm’s technology investments.

In a statement, BCLP co-chairs Lisa Mayhew and Steve Baumer said: “Dan is at the forefront of the technologies reshaping the legal industry today. As we continue our strategy of building strength-on-strength in priority, high-growth practices around the globe, Dan is a world-class leader who will be a tremendous asset to us and will play a key role in the next phase of innovation at BCLP in service to our clients.”

Surowiec spent more than 22 years at Bakers, half of that time as global CIO. He was also previously the firm’s director of global infrastructure and director of global technology operations. Prior to his career in the legal industry, he was a consultant at Whittman-Hart and a software engineer at NCR Corporation, according to his LinkedIn profile.

He said: “Driven by significant market interest and investment, along with increasing client focus on efficiency – that has only accelerated with the change in attitude and expectations coming out of the pandemic – there is a unique opportunity to transform the delivery of legal services and help lawyers use technology to improve their working lives and delight our clients.”

Earlier this month, UK national firm TLT hired the former global head of legal services at Eversheds Sutherland’s managed legal services business Konexo and legaltech veteran Jonathan Townend. 

Back in April, Dentons named Ash Banerjee as its global CIO, having joined the firm as its interim CIO last year from Hogan Lovells. And in March, Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer promoted its chief data officer Chris Smith to the CIO role.