July 08, 2021

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If you just read the sensational headlines (Like the header above), you might get the impression that legal tech will leave junior associates out of work – like work horses put to pasture by the combustion engine and the industrial revolution. Images come to mind of a post-apocalyptic sci-fi world, like Terminator or Blade Runner, where artificial intelligence has its grip on humanity as we struggle to survive. But, after surviving the COVID pandemic, reasonable minds are beginning to question if there’s more to the story.

Hold On: What Exactly Are These Robots Made Of?

Lawyers don’t have to worry about literal robots, yet. But the types of automation tools we’re talking about here are things like document automation and chatbots. Document automation is a technology that uses logic to combine elements of pre-existing text, user input, and data to create new documents. Document automation solutions generally guide the user with questions through the document creation process. Based on the user’s input, the system automatically uses that information to return a complete document back to the user. Document automation is much more than mail-merge, because it allows users to create documents using complex conditional reasoning that humans intuitively use when drafting documents. For example, if tasked to create divorce documents and the spouse indicates they have common children with the other spouse, the document automation system could ask further questions about the children, but not ask such follow up questions if they did not share any children in common. While in the past legacy platforms required users to learn code, a new generation of user-friendly automation tools that visually represent logical connections have replaced these older more cumbersome systems. Accordingly, new users or subject matter experts can create document automation projects faster and easier than before.

Chatbots are of a similar vein. Literally, a chatbot is defined as a computer program designed to simulate conversation with human users, especially over the Internet. However, far from the chatty Cathys of even five years ago, chatbots are now a practical and useful way to engage consumers to provide required data create documents and / or provide relevant and useful information. Chatbots’ conversational user interface is something that people are now accustomed to through their use of messaging on mobile phones. In The State of Chatbots Report, a survey of 1000+ adults, ages 18-64, conducted by Drift, Audience, Salesforce and myclever, consumers perceived many benefits to using chatbots. By far, the most common potential benefit of chatbots that consumers pointed to was the ability to get 24-hour service (64%). That was followed by getting instant responses to inquiries (55%), and getting answers to simple questions (55%). Anecdotally, some users have reported preferring chatbots because they didn’t want to be judged by another person and felt safer communicating with a machine. Chatbots can also make for a more accessible interface by allowing those who are hearing or physically or visually impaired to communicate by voice or text. Another way of thinking about chatbots is that they are the friendly face to act as a medium between the user and machine.

So now that we have a better understanding about what document automation and chatbots are, let’s return to the question of whether they’ll spell certain doom for junior associates.

A Silver Lining: Partners and Associates Collaborate to Program Robots and Learn from the Experience

While in the past law firms looked at document review, legal memos or research projects as easy ways for young lawyers to get up to speed, some modern law firms are looking at document automation and chatbots as a way to train the next generation of lawyers. Wilson Sosini, the eminent Silicon Valley law firm, has included its Build-A-Bot program for summer associates for the past three years. During that time Summer associates have built numerous applications that have found themselves inside of the firm’s workflows. As Cherie Conrad Beffa notes, this program “reflects our commitment to innovation by providing our summer associates with the kinds of hand-on, technological innovation experience that they will need to be successful in the legal industry of the future.”

But, as David Wang, the Chief Innovation Officer at Wilson Sonsini, pointed out: summer associates need more that than just technical knowledge to excel at building bots. Indeed, bot building and the related document automation gives junior employees vital learning experiences when creating them. In order to automate a process you have to understand it first.. Wang explained: “It’s difficult to successfully automate a nondisclosure agreement if you don’t know much about how those deals are structured,” Wang states. “You really need to have a deep understanding of the process from end-to-end because you need to account for all of those thing.”

When building a bot, the creators must understand what are the different moving pieces in the law, how that interacts with the document they want to create, and then create a user interface to help the user understand the scenarios that alter the document structure.. During the document automation process, a creator (associate), must explore precedent documents and integrate legal knowledge into a cohesive singular experience. This can entail learning opportunities where the creator reviews material with or interviews a partner or senior associate to understand the law and how it is typically applied in different contexts. By doing so, the creator gains significant expertise in how the law governs particular agreements like non-disclosures, privacy policies, sales agreements, and the like. As the young attorney gets more practice, they can even tackle more advanced projects, such as M&A and financing documents. At the end of the process, the firm gains a valuable reusable knowledge resource, while training the next generation of attorneys, a win-win proposition.

Back to the Future for Associate Training?

The future will be a lot like the past: junior associates will learn about the law and its application through research and consultation with more senior lawyers. The tools with which they undertake this education will be different. Chatbots and document automation can be a new way for associates to synthesize what they’ve learned and make it actionable and useful for others. Robots won’t replace lawyers, but they may end up making them better lawyers.