How AI can revolutionize your law firm
In the fast-paced world of legal practice, time is of the essence to deliver for your clients. People expect their cases to be resolved efficiently and effectively, and lawyers are constantly under pressure to perform. There are a variety of modern toolsets which can assist you in operating your business, among them are tools that are useful for automation or information discovery.
Understanding AI
First, it is worthwhile exploring and defining what Artificial Intelligence (AI) is. AI is often used as a short-hand for complex algorithms, a set of instructions, which can process a large amount of information very quickly. AI is however altogether different from general intelligence, as set out in the House of Lords Committee on AI there are five key indicators of intelligence: Emotional, Cognitive, Social, Technological, and Environmental. As you can imagine, ‘modern’ AI is unable to achieve all of these, but it can still do a lot.
Despite its limitations, with the advent of AI as we know it today, law firms can now streamline their operations and deliver better results to clients through advanced eDiscovery, content generation, and implementations of smarter contracts on the most relevant precedents. The Enterprisers Project explains the five kinds of AI here, we will be focussing on NLP in this piece. As a firm that has implemented the latest technologies for the largest firms in the UK, we have a deep understanding of the challenges lawyers face in navigating our complex field of technology. For some workloads, new tools such as ChatGPT are useful for particular use cases and are now integrated into Microsoft’s technology stack.
ChatGPT and data sovereignty
ChatGPT is a tool that uses NLP to search for common linguistic structures and respond to respond to human requests to produce, a poem for example. It can quickly analyze vast amounts of publicly available data to guide complex legal questions, search for information using Open Source Intelligence (OSINT) principles and construct complex documents for your review.
At this point, it is worth pausing to highlight that as with any cloud application, the data you input is not then data you own. This also includes client data, PII information should never be inputted into a non-enterprise application without the relevant risk assessments and data processing agreements.
NLP: your virtual legal assistant
ChatGPT is akin to having a virtual legal assistant who can handle simple tasks such as drafting documents, directing and conducting legal research, and even scheduling appointments with the right plug-ins. While the tool is limited in its data source given it was trained up to 2021 you can nonetheless use ‘plug-ins’ to expand its dataset and further enhance its results. NLP tools are altogether useful for freeing up your valuable time so that you can focus on the more critical aspects of the practice.
NLP is therefore a powerful tool that can revolutionize the way your law firm operates if used correctly. ChatGPT is not the only NLP tool, nor is it the first or the last. Regardless of your technology stack (Red Hat, Google, Microsoft, etc.) you will have access to these enterprise-ready NLP toolsets which can greatly reduce the time it takes for you to complete your work.
Improving efficiency, providing a better legal experience to clients, and building stronger relationships help you to charge customers more for your time. NLP enables you to build on being a technology-enabled law firm, with your expertise as the bedrock and technology as your method of delivery.
At Hayachi we’re experts at helping lawyers navigate the complexities of technology and using technology effectively to drive their success, in a cost-effective and compliant way.
