Boston’s final luncheon program of 2017 discussed one of this year’s hottest topics, artificial intelligence (AI) and its future in law firms. Attendees gathered at Sullivan & Worcester to hear Mark Greene, President of Market Intelligence LLC, share his insights on where AI is now and its future impact on the industry and legal marketers.
Mark explained to attendees that AI is by no means a new concept. In fact, it was first discussed by the Stanford Law Review in 1970. In today’s demand driven market, in-house counsel are continuing to push back on law firms and are asking for new ways to make legal services more efficient, including investing in AI tools. In addition to demanding that law firms to develop their own efficiency tools, companies like JP Morgan were able to replace 360,000 hours of work on contracts using AI. Alternative legal service providers (ALSPs) continue to join the market to fill this need, with providers focusing on expertise automation, legal research, prediction, contract analytics and electronic discovery.
So, how can artificial intelligence help law firms? Mark explored several areas in which AI can make a significant impact in the legal industry, including:
- Legal hiring/lateral recruitment
- Pricing: AI can help create pricing algorithms based on what work is profitable for the firm, what competitors are charging (third party data) and qualitative data based on an individual client perception of value.
- Content creation: First draft of content such as client alerts could be automatically generated for partner review to ensure content is disseminated to clients quickly.
- Predictive pitching: AI can help with tools that look at statistics on companies, industry trends and new legislation to determine when a company might get sued and proactively pitch before they get sued.
Mark noted that firms that will be able to successfully implement AI need to have a culture of information sharing and need to be easily able to harness their own data, partner data and third party data. Firms looking to get started should partner with key stakeholders and data owners, source complete data(marketing, finance, HR), and use early wins to build support and momentum.