Peer to Peer Magazine

P E E R T O P E E R : I L T A ' S Q U A R T E R L Y M A G A Z I N E | W I N T E R 2 0 1 9 11 are much more down-to-earth, focusing on machine learning and pattern recognition in order to analyze large amounts of data at high speeds and in turn automate routine tasks. Most of us are already using AI in our day-to-day lives, whether we realize it or not. On the personal front, innovations like Siri and Alexa have become mainstream. While AI on the work front may not seem as chatty, many administrative and routine processes have already been automated, and there's a high likelihood that the systems and platforms you use every day are already incorporating aspects of AI to streamline your workflows, possibly without your knowing. In the legal field, AI is largely aimed at leveraging data to increase efficiency, allowing firms to retain clients and generate revenue. Nonetheless, even as law firms are able to automate routine functions, human strengths like decision-making, intuitive questioning and rapid situational adjustments will always be critical to the practice of law and in making the key decisions and handling the high-value work that are integral to client services and retention. Lawyers will always be needed for face-to-face interactions, for emotional understanding that drives successful negotiations and for applying the honed legal experience that's critical to success. AI isn't here to replace those functions, but rather to free lawyers from mundane record keeping in order to perform skilled tasks better. Instead, AI is changing the legal work landscape largely through automation. While automation will certainly eliminate some repetitive tasks that have traditionally been performed manually, removing these tasks from a lawyer's workload doesn't necessarily mean eliminating jobs. Most jobs include certain elements that could benefit from automation, but for lawyers, a vast majority of day-to-day work is not of the manual or routine nature that can be completely automated. For the parts that can benefit from automation, AI helps lawyers manage their demanding workloads, spend less time on low-value tasks and deploy systems that prevent errors in routine work. We cannot overstate the benefit of AI tools that mitigate the risk of malpractice claims. This means that lawyers aren't at risk of being replaced by AI. Instead, lawyers stand to benefit from it by having administrative aspects of their jobs handled by an efficient system, freeing them to better use that time to focus on higher-value work that both benefits clients and boosts firm revenues. AI: What Lawyers Need to Understand The term AI brings a lot of images to mind, but it's important for lawyers to understand what we actually mean when we're talking about AI in today's legal profession. While the science of AI is ultimately aimed at creating machines capable of replicating human thought processes – hence the image of the robo-lawyer – today's AI applications Practical Applications of AI in Today's Legal World Today's legal AI is ideally suited to handling well-defined tasks that center around large amounts of data. Implementing AI in a law firm is not a one-size-fits-all proposition, and every firm will need to find the AI- enabled tools that best help them to solve their individual pain points and improve efficiencies. Nevertheless, certain AI solutions have gained widespread popularity and offer recognized benefits across the legal industry. 1. Contract and Document Automation Law has always been a document-centric industry. Generating, editing and finalizing documents, particularly complex contracts, have traditionally been tedious, time- intensive tasks. AI-enabled solutions can automate the process of generating contracts and agreements, speeding up that process while ensuring consistency and reducing errors. AI has the ability to create document templates and ensure the accuracy of standard clauses and terms with levels of speed and accuracy that humans can't hope to match. With the help of AI, lawyers can focus on serving clients and protecting their interests rather than spending countless hours on the administrative aspects of assembling, reviewing and exchanging redlined documents. 2. Research, Due Diligence and Discovery Machine learning and AI have huge implications for legal research, discovery and due diligence. These processes are critical to legal practice, but when performed solely by humans, all traditionally involve numerous hours devoted to identifying very specific results from large sets of data. The massive amounts of data involved in legal research, due diligence and e-discovery make these tasks ideal candidates for AI. AI tools can quickly and efficiently perform searches across vast datasets to identify relevant materials without attorneys having to spend – and charge for – excessive time. Instead, attorneys can focus their time on reviewing Lawyers will always be needed for face-to-face interactions, for emotional understanding that drives successful negotiations and for applying the honed legal experience that's critical to success.

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