TL;DR

• With more and more legal teams focusing on tech investments, legal professionals must be tech-savvy. 
• The demand for legal technologists is exponentially increasing, although there’s a significant gap in the market. 
• Organizations must address this by investing in upskilling programs, diversifying hiring to include IT and data science professionals, recognizing hybrid roles, and fostering cross-functional collaboration.
• This article will help you to find out if your legal team is future-ready. 

Do you know that 66% of legal leaders are planning to accelerate their investments in legal technology to manage workloads amid budget limitations? Legal tech adoption is on the rise, fully changing how lawyers operate in their day-to-day operations. Everything is moving from pen and paper to digital tasks, dashboards, and automation. Technology is the new legal assistant and it’s high time for lawyers to get comfortable with tech. 

“I think AI will eventually be a true gift to legal teams by freeing up more time for lawyers to be creative rather than just doing lower-level types of reviews that can be automated.”

~Genevieve Kelly, General Counsel at Goodwin Procter LLP.

While traditionally, lawyers were expected to learn only law, with technology foraying into the legal industry, lawyers are also expected to be tech-savvy. 

In this post, we will examine how AI is reshaping the legal industry and what the future looks like for legal tech talent. 

The changing landscape of legal professionalism 

To understand the pulse of the industry and how legal jobs are evolving, we surveyed 192 legal professionals, primarily from North America, who shared their valuable insights with us. The findings were interesting.

Methodology used

Our findings represent the perspectives of legal decision-makers who are actively shaping how AI is adopted and implemented within their organizations. They include in-house counsels, general counsels, directors of legal services, and legal ops managers. 

Here’s a glimpse of the survey results:

1. Strategic Thinking

30.5% of participants identified strategic thinking as the most critical skill in the legal profession.

2. Advanced Legal Knowledge

20.6% of respondents stated that advanced legal knowledge remains essential despite the growing influence of AI.

3. AI Tools & Technology

26.2% of respondents believe that AI tools will play a significant role in the legal industry.

4. Interpersonal Skills

While still valuable, only 5.7% ranked interpersonal skills as one of the top skill sets in the legal profession.

Although AI is making an impact and is becoming an indispensable assistant to human lawyers, our survey results highlight that strategic thinking, advanced legal knowledge, and sound technology knowledge are must-haves for a modern-day lawyer. 

"We're not just looking for good lawyers anymore. We're looking for lawyers who can think strategically about how technology changes our work and our value proposition."

‍— CLO, Financial Services Company

The growing demand for AI in the legal industry

Traditionally, lawyers were expected to have only legal knowledge. But as businesses become more adept at using AI, it’s becoming crucial for in-house lawyers to embrace AI. Putting it another way, in-house lawyers who are pivoting quickly and infusing AI skills into their existing legal knowledge are expected to become more valuable and indispensable to the new generation of CEOs and CFOs. 

This means that it’s high time for law schools to incorporate AI and Gen AI in their legal curriculum. For example, new-age in-house lawyers must be able to use AI and Gen AI to search for concepts like contract review and renewal or analyze documents for due diligence. AI can also be used to look for code words to understand the true nature of any conversation or identify any change in tone in the nature of a conversation, and so on. 

New emerging job role: Legal technologist

 As we’re witnessing the growing demand for tech in the legal industry, we can expect to see the emerging role of a new breed of legal professional—the legal technologist. These professionals will combine a deep understanding of legal principles with technological expertise, enabling them to:

• Bridge the gap between legal requirements and technical capabilities
• Identify opportunities for AI to enhance legal work
• Help teams adapt to new tools and workflows
• Reimagine how legal services are delivered

While many legal organizations are looking to upskill their existing professionals in these skills, some are creating dedicated roles for professionals with such skillsets. 

The talent gap is clear

Although the survey clearly indicates that the need for such hybrid skillsets is in demand in the law industry, the talent gap is evident. That’s mostly because most law firms still lack the internal training programs necessary to upskill their employees in AI tools. Second, law professionals with technology knowledge are highly sought after; as a result, the job market is becoming more competitive, making hiring and retention a challenge for many law firms. 

Bridging the talent gap

The need of the hour is to bridge the talent gap. But how? 

A few measures that can be taken by legal organizations:

• Investing in upskilling their existing team members through internal training programs focused on AI tools and data analysis. A learning culture must be fostered at workplaces to ensure their teams remain future-ready. 
• Legal organizations must also diversify their hiring pipeline and include professionals from other fields, especially IT, data science, and project management. These professionals are especially trained to infuse AI in the legal system. 

Also read: Scaling Legal Teams: Lessons from the Experts

• Organizations can attract top talent and provide clear growth opportunities by formally recognizing and rewarding roles that combine legal and technical expertise.

• Beyond hiring hybrid talent, leading organizations are creating structures that encourage collaboration between legal, IT, and data science teams.

How do you know if your legal team is future-ready?

Assess your team’s current skill set. Compare it to emerging AI trends and analyze how well it fits in an AI-enabled legal function.

Once you identify a skill gap, develop a training program to build technical literacy and strategic thinking for your team. 

Also read: 7 GCs on How to Prioritize Legal Resources & Boost Efficiency

Try to bring in employees with complementary skill sets when hiring and focus on building cross-functional teams. 

Know more about the impact of AI on in-house legal teams. Download the 2025 survey report.