Legal work is notoriously meticulous, making it slow, costly and demanding in terms of time and resources. Lawyers spend hours buried in contracts, drafting documents, chasing approvals and navigating complex compliance rules. And clients expect faster, more transparent legal services.
Traditional legal processes are outdated. Paper-heavy systems, manual contract negotiations, and slow workflows drain time and resources. Successful in-house legal departments are looking to replace time-consuming and labour-consuming processes with automated ones that offer greater accuracy and efficiency.
This is where legal technology comes in. Meant to be transformative, legal tech is slashing inefficiencies and redefining how legal teams operate. From AI-powered contract analysis to corporate legal matter management software and automated workflows, legal tech is reshaping the industry while saving General Counsel and their clients time and money.
Key ways legal tech helps save time and money
- Document automation
Perform routine tasks more quickly and easily with AI-powered tools. Lawyers can create, approve and renew contracts in minutes with built-in workflows that keep matters moving. Predefined templates ensure accuracy and consistency while streamlining the process. - Effective knowledge management
Reliably store and easily access everything with a centralized repository of structured and searchable information. Corporate legal matter management software allows in-house teams to quickly retrieve and reuse documents. Streamline knowledge-sharing processes by ensuring critical legal knowledge is readily available to team members when needed. - Case law research
An essential aspect of legal work, case law research is a part of every lawyer’s workload – regardless of experience. AI-powered case law research tools can scan millions of case law records in seconds, delivering accurate results and saving legal professionals hours of sifting through search results. - Improve work allocation
Avoid overlapping workloads, wasting time on redundant tasks, missing deadlines and underutilizing resources with innovative task management. With automatically generated task lists and real-time monitoring tools, in-house counsel gain visibility over the workload of their legal department, reducing unnecessary follow-ups and ensuring each task is assigned to the right team member. - Facilitate seamless collaboration
Create a culture of collaboration across all internal and external stakeholders with sophisticated tools that allow team members to work on documents in real time from anywhere. Rather than time-consuming email threads or lengthy meetings, workflow management software automatically alerts the next person in line, keeping processes efficient. - Turn data into insights
Bring transparency to every aspect of your in-house legal department’s legal work. Legal analytics tools save in-house counsel valuable time and help generate useful business insights. Track outside counsel costs, optimize budgets, prevent overspending and demonstrate the legal department’s value. - Smart intake and triage
Whether it’s an impromptu visit or a passing comment in an email, most in-house legal teams receive briefings from a large number of sources. A standardized intake and triage process cuts admin work and ensures consistency. Automated intake forms and data-driven triage free up resources, minimize staffing needs, speed up case handling and eliminate bottlenecks.
Case Study: Cutting 20+ hours of legal work every month
SAGE, a global industrial company across two continents and 18 offices, faced challenges in managing legal matters across its diverse business units. The implementation of Dazychain’s corporate legal matter management software was a “game changer” for the legal team.
The centralization of documents and tasks reduced time spent on searching for information and ensured consistent management of matters. With visibility into team members’ workloads and pending tasks, Dazychain enabled more effective delegation of tasks and responsibilities.
“It’s made our processes a lot more efficient,” said Sage Automation’s General Counsel, Emma Christie. “Now we can search historically to find an identical or similar matter.”
She added: “It’s hard to quantify, because across the team it’s variable, but we probably save at least 20 hours a month.”
Critical considerations
Data security
Data security and compliance are crucial, particularly for legal departments that manage sensitive information on a daily basis. In-house counsel must ensure the business adheres to data protection laws to ensure client confidentiality and regulatory compliance. Cybersecurity solutions include advanced encryption and secure cloud-based storage.
Adoption and training
Legal technology is constantly evolving, making it difficult to keep pace with new developments and regulations. For some companies, acceptance remains a major barrier. Those with entrenched traditional practices often hesitate to embrace digitization, delaying the transition.
Ethical issues
AI-driven legal services have sparked significant debate around fairness and accountability. Who bears the responsibility when algorithms make biased recommendations or errors? The challenge lies in establishing clear boundaries and ensuring accountability in these processes.
Future trends: What’s next for legal tech?
Legal technology is evolving rapidly, with new developments and advancements happening every day.
AI: Beyond automation
According to Thomson Reuters’ 2024 Future of Professionals Report, 77% of legal professionals believe AI will have a high or transformational impact on their work within the next five years. More and more companies are leveraging AI as a key driver in decision-making. From advanced contract analysis to predicting case outcomes, AI is fast becoming an integral tool for legal professionals.
Blockchain and smart contracts
Blockchain is streamlining legal transactions with smart contracts – self-executing contracts that automatically enforce agreements. They eliminate the need for middlemen, cutting costs and processing time. While adoption is low, its potential to revolutionize contract management is undeniable.
Navigating new ethical and regulatory challenges
As AI becomes increasingly central to business operations, lawyers will play an even more critical role in ensuring companies comply with rules and regulations around its use. Bias and accountability are growing concerns, and legal professionals must mitigate the legal risks of AI applications.
How to implement new tech for your team
In-house counsel can not afford to ignore the digital transformation. What once took hours, automation now handles in minutes. While legal tech handles contract creation and compliance checks, lawyers are free to focus on strategy, negotiations and client support. No longer bogged down by administration, legal teams can cut costs while maintaining high-quality legal services.
Process automation is transforming legal workflows and Dazychain’s corporate legal matter management software is pioneering a faster, smarter legal industry. This easy-to-use and intuitive system simplifies operations, allowing your legal department to unlock new opportunities and drive success.
