(This article was published in the August 2024 edition of Legal Business World magazine.)

It feels like a different world from when I co-founded my first AI-based legal tech company, eBrevia, in 2011. While it continues to evolve in exciting new directions today, at the time, eBrevia was a contract analytics pioneer focused on addressing many of the pain points I had felt myself while tackling due diligence projects in M&A. Together with a few scrappy competitors, we were working to create a market for AI solutions on the corporate side of law firms and in-house legal departments.

Often facing skeptical clients and investors in the early days, much of our time was spent educating legal leaders on how our technology could provide both improved work product and better economics for their organization.

Today, my new company, Coheso, a GenAI-based legal front door and work management platform for in-house legal and compliance teams, faces a very different landscape. It’s now clear to many that AI and other complementary technologies support enhanced workflows and offer important solutions to common friction points in the practice of law. There is no longer a question of whether AI will impact the legal industry. It already has and will continue to do so at a rapid rate. With the introduction of GenAI, disruptors in the legal tech space are already identifying solutions to problems that couldn’t be solved a few years ago.

Amid the enthusiasm around AI, there is a growing effort to understand the implications for individuals and society at large. Lawyers and other legal personnel are beginning to question how GenAI will impact their work, team, and company or firm. It’s hard to ignore the concern among some employees of their eventual displacement in light of rapid advancements. On the other hand, AI companies promise relief from tedious workflows and repetitive work.

These contrasting views can make it difficult to understand what these changes mean for individuals and teams and how professionals can best position themselves in an evolving legal industry.

Both perspectives play important roles in shaping the future impact of GenAI. The measured and cautionary will temper the optimistic pioneers as AI continues to develop. Regulatory bodies worldwide are actively working on new rules to govern artificial intelligence technology.[1] From President Biden’s recent Executive Order[2] to the newly approved EU AI Act[3], the first of its kind, world leaders are moving quickly to set standards around the development and deployment of AI. Businesses also have an opportunity to contribute to the development of this technology through their own policies as they seek to adopt new solutions. These layers of evolving standards will ultimately define the requirements for new technology and, by extension, influence the perimeters of the solutions themselves.

In addition to defining the governance standards for these technologies, companies that incorporate them into their workflows have an opportunity to decide their success metrics. The technology itself does not determine the outcome. Companies will face tough decisions as they consider the role of AI in their enterprises. Their decisions will directly impact the future of work and to what degree it is automated versus augmented.

Through automation, tasks or work done by humans, including human decision-making, are replaced by machines. If the vast majority of tasks related to any given role are automated, this often results in a decrease in the jobs related to that work and requires employees to reskill or upskill to find new roles. On the other hand, augmentation changes how tasks are completed as humans collaborate with machines. According to David H. Autor, an MIT economics professor, “You can think of automation as a machine that takes a job’s inputs and does it for the worker. We think of augmentation as a technology that increases the variety of things that people can do, the quality of things people can do, or their productivity.”[4] When the augmenting technology matches the needs of the worker, it ideally makes their day-to-day life easier, including at times by automating some lower-level tasks, and frees up time for higher-order work.

According to the often-cited 2023 study from Goldman Sachs, 44% of legal tasks can be automated by GenAI.[5] In 2017, McKinsey analyzed how the automation of individual tasks would impact occupations.[6] At that time, “less than 5 percent” of occupations could be fully automated using then available technology even though “in about 60 percent of occupations, at least one-third of the constituent activities could be automated.”[7] This led McKinsey to predict “substantial workplace transformations.”[8]

In “Using Technology to Make Work More Human,” Allison Fine and Beth Kanter offer a hopeful perspective.[9] Rather than debate whether task automation is beneficial or detrimental, they suggest a path forward where automation of specific tasks creates an opportunity to redefine how we work and allows us to focus on our human strengths, “such as relationship building, intuitive decision making, empathy, and problem solving.”[10]. This outcome is not guaranteed. Fine and Kanter suggest it “will require informed, careful, strategic thought to ensure the technology is used to enhance our humanity and enable people to do the kinds of relational, empathetic, problem-solving activities we do best.”[11]

This isn’t the first time technology has disrupted the workforce. We’ve grappled with many of these questions before, albeit at a different scale and speed. As Mark Twain is purportedly to have said, “History doesn’t repeat itself, but it often rhymes.” As we try to make sense of this uncertain future, it can be instructive to look to the past for lessons in the similarities and differences in what we see today. In this case, the parallels to the Industrial Revolution are hard to ignore.

During the Industrial Revolution, the introduction of machines, mass manufacturing, and assembly lines forever changed the experience of workers. As the demand for unskilled labor replaced the role of craftsmen, the pay gap widened and conditions deteriorated. Workers were expected to become quasi-machine-like in their execution of tasks and a little less human in their needs. In this historical context of augmentation, efficiency and productivity became the guiding principles of the time, and the mechanization of industries became the vehicle.

It’s important to highlight, however, that not all augmentation is the same. When we discuss augmentation today, we are optimistic and have good reason to be. At the time of the Industrial Revolution, augmentations removed much of what made work worthwhile by introducing highly controlled and repetitive structures. Humans were asked to perform more like machines. Today, we have the opportunity to offer the opposite. Automating repetitive work to augment humans is not just good for workers; it’s also what AI does best. There is a synergy that didn’t exist in the Industrial Revolution.

McKinsey predicts that by 2030, “More jobs than those lost or gained will be changed as machines complement human labor in the workplace.”[12] This is the trajectory we’ve seen as the legal industry has adopted new technologies in recent years. With each new technology, practitioners have adjusted. We’ve seen dramatic changes in how lawyers work with the introduction of tools to assist with discovery, legal research, brief analysis, contract analysis, and more.

In each instance, lawyers have had more information and been better equipped to provide higher quality products to their clients while enjoying more flexibility in where and how they work. With respect to due diligence, where attorneys review a target company’s contracts and other documentation as part of an acquisition, I can’t think of a single lawyer who wishes they could return to a time when they had to fly to a physical office to go through the process. I even remember once receiving boxes of documents on the side of a highway to keep an acquisition quiet. At the same time, as the practice of law evolves, we’ve seen an increase in legal ops and knowledge management leaders across the profession, allowing lawyers to focus on providing the best counsel possible.

In “AI Won’t Replace Lawyers — But It Will Change How They Work,” Ken Crutchfield highlights that increases in innovation have not historically led to decreases in employment.[13]

Rather, economic and competitive factors, not innovation, are the strongest indicators of employment trends.[14] This has held true in the legal industry. Despite rapid technological advancements, in February 2024, Reuters reported a near-record high number of legal jobs based on data from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, which includes lawyers and nonlawyers in the legal field.[15] While this data doesn’t tell us how the makeup of the legal field may have changed over time, it does provide a level of comfort in light of past predictions. Technology has and will continue to impact the legal industry in significant ways. If we can set aside our fears, we can embrace the benefits of these new technologies, such as improved workflows, greater efficiency, and more accurate outcomes.

Given the rapidly evolving legal landscape, it is essential for legal professionals to be strategic in their adoption of GenAI tools. Unlike prior innovations in this field, not only is the underlying technology advancing at an incredible speed, but the ecosystem of companies ready to apply this powerful technology to legal use cases has significantly expanded.

The best way to guard against automation of a role or work shifting to those who are better augmented is for professionals to embrace augmentation themselves. In order to do so, I would give the following advice to legal professionals interested in innovation. Start by seeking out demos of tools that address your current pain points related to routine and repetitive work rather than waiting for new technology to come to you. To better understand related pain points, in-house attorneys can also listen to the needs and frustrations of internal clients and business stakeholders to consider how technology could best address challenges faced by those engaging with the legal department.

If you have time to invest in this effort, try multiple solutions. You’ll learn more about what you like and don’t like. This is also a great opportunity to familiarize yourself with tools other firms or legal departments may use. Start to generate a list of criteria for tools you want to incorporate in your work. Look for improvements in your productivity, workflow, and end work products. The best solutions augment your talents and enable you or work faster, more easily, and generate better results.

Follow and engage legal tech leaders in your domain on LinkedIn to stay on top of new developments. The technology is moving so quickly you might not realize the tasks with which software is now able to assist. Companies building these tools want to hear from you. The best tools out there have great onboarding and support to help you succeed. Although learning a new tool can take some effort and time initially, it will pay off in the long term.

Be sure to think about your overall work experience as well. The best tool for you should make your day-to-day easier and more enjoyable.

Ideally, you are freed from some of the repetitive tasks that bog you down and have more time to focus on work that allows you to use your unique capabilities.

Be sure to touch base with your knowledge management or legal operations groups. They are wonderful resources and can guide you to technologies already available to your company or firm. They can also help you find new technologies and evaluate their application to your use cases. At the same time, they’ll likely have a sense for which of your current processes are most likely to benefit from technology. It’s important that you’re closely coordinating with them related to any exploration of tools to make sure your efforts are in line with your company’s or firm’s policies.

Keep an open dialogue with internal or external clients to understand their expectations. If you are in-house, you may also have an opportunity to shape tools used by outside counsel. Consider partnering with firms that are proactively incorporating new solutions into their practice. Not only will they be able to provide you with services at better prices, but they will also likely be able to do so faster and more accurately.

Finally, as noted above, in addition to learning to integrate and use new technology, focus on improving and leaning into your unique human skills, like problem-solving and relationship building.[16] Whether you are in the early stages of your career or getting ready to retire, you’ve likely already encountered changes in how things are done. Some big, some small. Being adaptable is key, just as it has been all along. You have an opportunity to shape how your job evolves by choosing technologies that augment your strengths and serve you and how you want to work.

The widespread excitement for GenAI is at times tempered by concerns about its potential implications on the future of work including in the legal industry. Applying a historical lens to current developments, we can see both similarities and differences with respect to how prior technological transformations have driven automation and augmentation as it relates to various roles. In this unique moment, by taking a proactive approach, legal practitioners have an opportunity to embrace augmenting technology to increase the value they’re creating for their firms or companies and improve their day-today work experience. Ultimately, through augmentation, GenAI provides the potential to make legal work more human.

Notes

[1] Ryan-Mosley, Tate, Melissa Heikkilä, and Zeyi Yang. "What’s Next for AI Regulation in 2024?" MIT Technology Review, 5 Jan. 2024, Link.

[2] "Executive Order on the Safe, Secure, and Trustworthy Development and Use of Artificial Intelligence." The White House, 30 Oct. 2023, Link.

[3] "EU AI Act: First Regulation on Artificial Intelligence." European Parliament, 8 June 2023, Link.

[4] Dizikes, Peter. "Does Technology Help or Hurt Employment?" MIT News, 1 Apr. 2024, Link.

[5] Hatzius, Jan, Joseph Briggs, Devesh Kodnani, and Giovanni Pierdomenico. "The Potentially Large Effects of Artificial Intelligence on Economic Growth." Global Economics Analyst, Goldman Sachs, 27 Mar. 2023, Link.

[6] Manyika, James, Susan Lund, Michael Chui, Jacques Bughin, Lola Woetzel, Parul Batra, Ryan Ko, and Saurabh Sanghvi. "Jobs Lost, Jobs Gained: What the Future of Work Will Mean for Jobs, Skills, and Wages." McKinsey & Company, 28 Nov. 2017, Link.

[7] Manyika, et al., "Jobs Lost, Jobs Gained.”

[8] Manyika, et al., "Jobs Lost, Jobs Gained.”

[9] Fine, Allison, and Beth Kanter. "Using Technology to Make Work More Human." Harvard Business Review, 18 Mar. 2022, Link.

[10] Fine and Kanter, "Using Technology to Make Work More Human.”

[11] Fine and Kanter, "Using Technology to Make Work More Human.”

[12] Manyika, James, and Kevin Sneader. “AI, Automation, and the Future of Work: Ten Things to Solve For.” McKinsey & Company, 1 June 2018, Link.

[13] Crutchfield, Ken. "AI Won’t Replace Lawyers — But It Will Change How They Work." Above the Law, 26 Mar. 2024, Link.

[14] Crutchfield, "AI Won’t Replace Lawyers.”

[15] Thomas, David. "US Legal Jobs Returned Near Record High in February, Labor Dept Says." Reuters, 8 Mar. 2024, Link.

[16] Fine and Kanter, "Using Technology to Make Work More Human.”