The conversation around AI in legal has moved decisively on. A clear theme emerged from our recent Chief AI Officer panel discussions: the question is no longer whether to use AI, but how to deploy it responsibly, at scale, and with real return on investment. And the real impact comes from how it is embedded into everyday legal work.
We kicked off our global Chief AI Officer event series in Australia, bringing together in house legal leaders to explore what Hybrid Intelligence looks like in practice: where AI is embedded into legal workflows, human judgement remains accountable, and insight is delivered at scale.
For GCs and Legal Ops leaders, AI is no longer a side experiment or innovation stream. It is an operating model issue that touches workflow design, risk management, resourcing, pricing and capability. Progress depends less on tool selection and more on how legal work is structured, supervised and delivered across the business.
From “Should we?” to “How do we?”
Panellists reflected on a clear change in mindset over the past 12-18 months. Early debates about AI risk and pilots have given way to more pragmatic questions: how AI fits into daytoday legal workflows, how it integrates with existing tools, and how legal teams measure value.
For corporate legal teams, this shift looks different than it does for law firms. Unlike firms, inhouse teams are often a small part of the business and not its core function. Legal functions must work within broader enterprise constraints – IT governance, procurement cycles, and competing organisational priorities – which makes “build vs buy” decisions far more complex.
Start with the problem, not the tool
A recurring theme was the importance of starting with real legal problems rather than AI capability. Successful adoption comes from breaking legal work into discrete tasks and identifying where AI can meaningfully support those steps.
The most effective teams are not chasing “big bang” transformation, but stacking small, highimpact improvements that compound over time.
In practice, this has led many legal teams to focus on:
- Lowfriction productivity gains, such as summarisation, firstpass reviews and playbookdriven contract analysis
- Frontdoor legal interfaces, helping business users provide clearer instructions and surface issues earlier
- Reusing existing enterprise technology before introducing bespoke legal tools
Governance is the enabler, not the brake
Responsible AI governance has emerged as a critical enabler of progress, not a barrier to it. Panellists emphasised that AI should be treated much like a junior team member: powerful, fast, and capable – but always supervised.
In practice this means:
- Clear human-in-the-loop review expectations
- An understanding of AI limitations, not just its outputs
- Alignment with enterprisewide risk, data and security frameworks
Strong governance creates confidence both internally and with external advisers, allowing legal teams to move faster without compromising trust.
Where the real value lies
While efficiency gains are important, the panel highlighted a more significant opportunity: data enrichment. AI enables legal teams to analyse far larger datasets than previously possible, producing deeper insights, stronger benchmarks and more informed strategic advice. It creates time and insight – not just speed.
In practice, this translates into:
- Earlier visibility of legal and commercial risk
- More time to think, test and shape strategy
- Better informed conversations with boards, executives and external counsel
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