Building for the Future
Meet Everlaw's New Chief Technology Officer, Max Christoff
Everlaw welcomes Max Christoff as our first Chief Technology Officer. With more than 25 years of experience leading engineering teams at Google and Morgan Stanley, Max brings expertise in applying advanced technology to solve meaningful problems, an approach that aligns well with Everlaw's mission of promoting justice by illuminating truth for the legal field.
We recently sat down with Max to learn about his journey from building products for billions of users to transforming legal technology, his perspective on AI's role in the legal industry, and what drew him to Everlaw.
Your experience at Google and Morgan Stanley is impressive, and you've led some incredible teams at both companies. What made you want to switch things up and transition to legal tech?
The constant for me is tech doing useful things for humans – the utilitarian aspect – which is what led me to help with Google Wallet and Chrome Browser. I wanted it to create a tool that people had in their pocket and would save time and make them more productive.
I also wanted to be in a place where I can apply AI to solve specific problems and hard problems. How do you unlock value that you didn't even know was possible? Legal kept coming up as a space where AI and tech could enhance the industry.
I'm interested in solving whole problems instead of pieces.
What made you feel like Everlaw was the right fit for your next career endeavor?
Everlaw could make a big difference, and I tuned into this as soon as I met AJ. The decision was multifaceted, but customer focus, quality, product that people love and engineering culture all stood out to me outside of AJ being great. Everlaw is legal tech that is already transforming the industry, and I want to be able to lead here and capitalize on this moment in time.
As you learned about Everlaw, as a company and a platform, what specific technical challenges drew you in?
I didn't go into this search thinking about this specifically, but I wanted a company that had a foot in the door for breaking the status quo. LLMs are good at certain things but there is sometimes a path to ensuring they are great. Working with text and document editing meshes well to do a particular job and how I can make a difference. Working in full-stack environments is my preference, and I want to understand how we solve this or that problem for real people.
Everlaw is integrated into the cloud, deep in document processing, AI, search indexes, plugging into all of these layers to make it a great fit. I'm interested in solving whole problems instead of pieces.
Where do you see the biggest untapped opportunities for AI in the legal tech industry?
Lawyers don’t have interest in adopting something that maybe makes one thing a little bit faster, but then introduces a whole bunch of new risks to worry about or clean up problems. I think the ‘aha’ moment for many lawyers will be when they realize they have tools that they can depend on. We don't need to bestow human-like personalities on what we're building in order for it to add value and do useful work for people. We can put great and useful tech in lawyers' hands to help humans do productive work.
What would you say are the best pieces of career advice you've received?
First, surround yourself with people smarter than you. There's always an opportunity to learn more things over time. There's always so much to learn, this is not a checkmark you can make; the learning never stops.
Also, building consumer grade experiences is important, not having a lower bar for quality or ease of use because people are using the tool for work or because experts are the only ones using it. Craft and care is essential for the end user. They need to be able to understand how it works. I've taken this with me throughout my career.
Lastly, make sure your energy matches the opportunity. You can't fake it and if you're in it, it will show over time. You shouldn't invest in things that don't align with your energy. If the role details don't fill you with excitement then maybe that next role or next level is not right for you.
What's your vision for Everlaw's engineering team and culture as the company grows?
Engineering standards are high here, and there's no shortage of interesting problems to work on no matter your area of expertise. From a range of skills to the learning opportunities for a software engineer, the potential is high and the ability to shift between features is high. You can learn from some great technical leaders. The engineering culture and commitment to building for the long term is really appealing.
Everlaw for Good has also really resonated with me. It's important that as a company, we're not just pushing AI for our clients, but we're interested in making sure this technology can actually help those who can't afford it, because it is a critical element to leveling the playing field in legal.
Looking ahead, I'm excited to work alongside the leadership team to define our strategic vision for innovation in this rapidly evolving legal technology sector. As the legal industry continues to adopt AI and incorporate new tools that are transforming productivity and the discovery process, I'm looking forward to working with the team to advance our offerings to best support the needs of our users.
From a range of skills to the learning opportunities for a software engineer, the potential is high. The engineering culture and commitment to building for the long term is really appealing.
What are you most excited about working in Oakland?
I'm excited because of the better commute, but the local talent pool is so amazing. There are a lot of amazing engineers, designers who actually live in the East Bay but feel that they have to cross a bridge or drive down to the South Bay to find a cutting edge tech opportunity. So I'm super excited that we're building and investing right here, and we'll be looking for some of the Bay Area's best talent to join us.
We're excited to have Max on board as Everlaw enters its next phase of growth and innovation. Welcome to Everlaw, Max!
