Train law students on how to use AI in legal practice: Forum

Chief Justice Sundaresh Menon observed at the Litigation Conference 2024 on April 3 that lawyers will increasingly rely on artificial intelligence (AI) tools, rather than junior lawyers or paralegals, for research, drafting and other basic legal tasks. In turn, law firms will stand to reap substantial costs by deploying such tools in place of junior lawyers or paralegals.

This means there will likely be fewer junior lawyers and paralegals as more routine legal tasks become automated by technology. This has serious implications for how we will train junior lawyers in such an environment. 

I started legal practice in an era where a junior lawyer would learn the ropes by doing basic tasks: bundling, compiling, paginating, proof-reading, research and basic drafting. I would then observe how my senior lawyers would use the documents I had prepared to make a killer argument in court. I observed how small steps led to big wins. It took years to hone my craft. 

In three to five years, AI tools will soon change the face of how lawyers (and many other professions) work.

My juniors will no longer go through the learning process the way I did – by starting from the bottom. Instead, they will have to learn to work with AI tools and learn higher-order skills faster. They will be expected to be more productive and work more efficiently.

Senior lawyers like myself cannot help them through this process because we did not grow up in the age of AI. Conversely, we will have to learn from them and upscale our legal practices and also incorporate AI into our workflow. 

AI will not take over the role of lawyers because of our human touch, our legal and commercial strategic acumen, and our creativity. The top-level skills that lawyers need to develop remain the same. But both young and older lawyers will need to learn how to harness the new AI tools. And senior lawyers need to change the way we teach and impart skills to our juniors.

Can educational institutions train law students on how to use AI in legal practice and also see how they can coach senior lawyers on incorporating AI into the workflow? I hope they do so soon – and not just for the legal profession but for others too.

Danny Quah

Source: Straits Times © SPH Media Limited. Permission required for reproduction.

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