VIVA CLOC Vegas—Not Just the One Around Flava Flav’s Neck!

A Decade of Disruption: CLOC Roars into Vegas

Some conferences whisper. The Corporate Legal Operations Consortium (CLOC) Global Institute 2025 roared into Vegas in heels, sequins, and a full-force legal ops takeover.

From the second my stilettos hit the casino floor (yes, again—no, still not packing sensible shoes), I could feel it. This wasn’t just another legal tech get-together. This was legal professionals showing up, showing out, and making it crystal clear who’s shaping the future of legal technology.

Think Coachella meets Davos, but instead of blockchain hype and ESG slide decks, it was packed rooms of in-house trailblazers, law firm strategists, and platform architects dissecting everything from spend optimization to tech stack chaos—usually with sequins, always with substance.

Ten years ago, CLOC was a few legal ops rebels duct-taping workflows in a borrowed conference room. Now? It’s 2,300 professionals, dozens of countries, hundreds of AI-powered tools, and the undeniable connective tissue of modern legal departments.

Content That Slayed + The Legal Ops Glow-Up

CGI 2025 didn’t flirt with disruption. It hit the strip, dropped its blazer, and got to work.

The sessions didn’t float in theory—they dropped tactics like confetti. What’s working. What flopped. What got duct-taped and shipped anyway. It was less “future of legal” and more “here’s how we MacGyvered that CLM nightmare at 2am without setting off procurement.”

AI wasn’t a sidebar—it was front and center, running hot while ops teams rebuilt the engine mid-case. At Reveal’s AI platform, we’re helping legal professionals surface hot docs before the first coffee hits, skip the haystack, and turn workflows into wins. No whitepapers. No someday. It’s already happening.

And the vibe? Gritty, not glossy. From Onna’s teardown of data sprawl to ops teams outing their legacy stacks like bad exes, the collective mood was: enough. Duct tape has had its day.

Legal ops didn’t glow up. It showed up. Tired of asking. Done waiting. Already building the next thing—even if it’s mid-chaos.

What’s Old Is Dead. What’s Next Is Already Here.

At CGI 2025, no one was asking what legal operations is. No one needed convincing. The mood was: “We know what it is. Now how do we make it work faster, smarter, leaner—with less fire and fewer spreadsheets?”

And the answer, over and over again, was AI—not as a shiny object or a nice-to-have, but as the engine.

At Reveal, we’re deep into the “doing” phase too. Our clients aren’t dipping their toes—they’re triaging investigations, surfacing key insights, and reimagining what timelines should look like. And unlike some industry claims, none of that is vaporware.

Still, what I loved most was the honesty—especially in the hallways. I had more than one off-mic conversation where a legal ops lead admitted that AI rollout felt like trying to run a Formula 1 engine on a tricycle chassis. The platform might be powerful, but the organizational change? Not so much. And let’s be honest—getting lawyers to change platforms is like teaching a cat to swim: possible, but prepare to bleed.

We don’t sugarcoat. We troubleshoot. And then we go right back in.

It wasn’t just AI. Contract lifecycle management woes were still haunting teams. Outside counsel spend? Still more of an art than a science. Platform sprawl and data silos? Alive and well, thank you very much.

The Pivot Point: Ten Years In, Still in Motion

One of the most surprising moments at CGI 2025 didn’t come from a keynote or a karaoke bar. It came from the news splashed across every hallway conversation: CLOC is flipping the venue script.

Some folks saw a location change. I saw a version upgrade.

Ten years in, CLOC isn’t slowing down—it’s mutating. Again. Chicago’s not just a new zip code. It’s a reminder that comfort breeds stagnation, and legal ops doesn’t do stagnation. We’re sharks in blazers—we keep moving or we drown in platform backlogs.

And that’s always been the real engine here. We build in motion. We test in prod. We ship before the workflows are done syncing. It's not pretty—but it works. And this next phase? It’s not about locking in best practices. It’s about staying just uncomfortable enough to innovate.

So yes, we’re trading poolside panels for wind tunnels and Malört. But in exchange, we get momentum. Space to stretch. Permission to scrap what isn’t working and rebuild something sharper—even if it’s mid-conference and halfway through a bad coffee.

Legal Ops 2.0 isn’t looming on some distant horizon. It already showed up, asked why you’re still manually routing contracts, and is quietly rewriting your intake process behind the scenes.

The next chapter isn’t more of the same. It’s whatever we build next—on purpose, in motion, and probably while mid-bite of deep dish.

CLOC After Dark: Sequins, Strategy, and Surprise Integrations

Yes, I stayed for CGI After Dark. Wouldn’t miss it.

Flo Rida brought the boots with the fur. Flava Flav showed up with a blinged-out clock that was, frankly, the least chaotic accessory in the room. But legal ops? We brought the real spectacle: sequins, unsolicited product feedback, and a whispered demo that may or may not have been scheduled between shots. By the third chorus of “Low,” someone had agreed to a pilot without realizing they were pitching it.

Because let’s be real—even when the bass drops, the brainstorms don’t stop. This crew can debate AI ethics, platform gaps, and CLM integrations… in heels… mid-chorus… during “Apple Bottom Jeans.” I’ve seen it. I may have done it.

It wasn’t just a party. It was a vibe shift with better lighting. Nothing about that night was accidental. The so-called gossip? Half of it turned into vendor strategy by morning. The sarcasm? Less throwaway, more prototype.
Half the expo floor was quoting it by breakfast.
And the sparkle? Non-negotiable.

Gratitude, Glitter, and What’s Next

To Jenn McCarron and the entire CLOC leadership team: thank you for throwing a decade-long masterclass on community, connection, and calling B.S. when needed.

To the Reveal team: you keep pushing the envelope on what AI can do—and then lighting that envelope on fire just to see what’s next. Keep going.

To every legal ops pro who swapped notes, shared scars, traded secrets, and refused to settle for status quo—thank you. You’re not just shaping the profession. You are the profession.

As I repacked my rhinestone blazers and swapped stilettos for slides at the gate, I had one thought: legal ops isn’t a trend. It’s the framework. And this next phase? It’s not for the faint of heart—or the flat-footed.

See you in Chicago.

Cat Casey is Chief Growth Officer at Reveal and a globally recognized legal AI influencer. She speaks around the world on corporate legal operations, AI, eDiscovery, and the future of legal technology. When she’s not onstage or behind a mic, she’s likely plotting her next sequin blazer—or rewriting your tech stack in her sleep.