What Clients Expect of Lawyers Using AI

For solo lawyers, AI is not just a technology issue.

It is now part of what clients expect in relation to service, cost, speed, clarity and trust.

Clients Still Care About Outcomes But Not Your AI Tool

Better, faster and cheaper still governs.

When thinking about what clients are expecting of lawyers now that AI is here, I think it really goes back to the old adage that has not changed for a long, long time - better, faster and cheaper.

That is still what clients want obviously.

What has changed is that technology is the thing that allows that to happen in a more realistic way.

Lawyers on their own cannot just keep delivering better, faster and cheaper indefinitely by themselves. Technology is what helps make that possible, and AI is now part of that.

I do not think most clients really care whether we are using AI or not, or what specific tools we are using, or what models or agents. Or else they accept you are using AI as a matter of course.

I think that is mostly irrelevant to them.

What they want is the best possible outcome and they want it as quickly as possible, and at the lowest possible price.

So in that respect, I think there is now also an expectation that your lawyer is using AI so that you are getting that better outcome, especially as other lawyers are using it.

It then translates and becomes a version of my lawyer and AI are better than your lawyer and AI.

The Tools Matter Less Than The Standards

Amongst all of that, ethics, privacy, confidentiality and professional standards still have to be maintained.

They have not gone away in any way, shape or form so notwithstanding the pressure of better, faster and cheaper, and notwithstanding the fact that clients may be indifferent to the actual tool, model or system being used, the duties of a lawyer still remain.

Really, the client just needs to be reassured that the tool is not leaking their privileged information, that there is human verification and quality assurance, and that there are value-added parts along the chain. They want to know that the efficiency of the routine work has already been taken into account and that the quality of what they are getting is really the best that the lawyer can provide in the circumstances.

Productivity Gains Do Not Mean Magic

I also think there is an expectation from clients that any gains in productivity made through AI by the lawyer should somehow be passed on to the consumer.

But I think that is too simplistic.

It assumes the lawyer has just miraculously discovered AI, is feeding everything into it, taking everything out of it, and then simply spitting it back to the client. That is a very naïve way of looking at it.

Yes, there can be productivity gains but there are also costs relating to the implementation of AI being learning, maintaining, training, testing, checking outputs, verification, supervision and all the rest of it. All of that has to be factored in as well. So while there may well be efficiencies, the idea that everything becomes instantly cheaper is not really right.

Fixed fees and cost certainty will matter more than ever yes.

Preventative And Predictive Lawyering Is Coming

I also think one of the real changes we are going to see is a whole new level of products and services on the preventative and predictive side of lawyering that we really have not seen before.

Analytics is one thing but diagnostics, preventative guidance and predictive advice in relation to a client’s particular circumstances, based on the data they are able to input and the information available, is where I think things are heading.

I do not think that has yet been fully factored in but that is where I think this is going.

Transparency and disclosure to the client are also very important.

The client should be told that AI is being used. I think most clients would in fact expect that it is being used but they should still be told how it is being used, what it is being used for, and that should be documented as well.

It should also be made clear that there is a human in the loop and that there is verification as well as technical expertise being applied. It may be that AI is used for some preliminary work, or for a first pass, or for some final polishing, but the key point is that the lawyer remains involved and the client is aware of all of the above.

The Lawyer Should Be At The Front Of It

My own view is that the human should be at the front of it.

The lawyer should define the problem, work out what needs to be done, decide what should go to AI and what should not, and then assess what comes back. In more basic matters, the human in the loop may be a junior lawyer. In more important matters, it should be a senior lawyer. Either way, the lawyer must still be there.

I think this is also where the judgment of an experienced lawyer with technical and technological expertise becomes especially important. That, in my view, is where the client is going to get the biggest benefit - having senior lawyers doing their work using technology that takes the work to its next level in all sorts of different dimensions.

I think the modern lawyer, being an AI-enabled lawyer, will increasingly be a facilitator of strategy, complex legal analysis, technical overview, case strategy, deeper client relationship management and verification. The lawyer’s role becomes more valuable, not less, provided the lawyer is actually bringing judgment to the process.

AI Still Has To Be Supervised

At the end of the day, for matters that really count, the client still wants a lawyer involved. The routine and simple work will increasingly be automated, but the things that really matter still require legal judgment, good advice, accountability and someone taking responsibility for the outcome.

That is why your lawyer has to treat AI a bit like a junior lawyer or a paralegal. It has to be supervised. Its work has to be checked. You cannot rely on blind-faith outcomes.

Some of that lower-level verification may be done by junior lawyers. More senior work may still require more senior supervision but even then, junior lawyers themselves still need supervision. With the rise of autonomous agents, I think we will see more and more of that too - lawyers supervising autonomous agents, again with scope for junior lawyers to be involved in that supervision but ultimately the senior lawyer or partner will have to make the final decision, and the client will expect that.

Clients Are Arriving Better Informed

Another thing that changes client expectations is that the client can now do preliminary work themselves before coming to the lawyer.

We saw an earlier version of this when the internet became more widely used. People would cobble together agreements from precedents they found online and bring them in. Usually that did not work very well, because people are not lawyers.

But large language models have changed that. The quality of the information coming out is better than it has ever been.

I still would not call it legal advice but it is clearly much more accessible, much more available, and much better presented than what people were getting before. It is available 24/7, can answer basic legal questions and can provide basic legal information either cheaply or for free.

That changes things.

It means the client may be much more informed before they even speak to a lawyer.

Simplicity And Clarity Now Matter More

AI is very good at translating the complex into the simple and clear.

I think that is one of the biggest practical changes here.

Clients want advice in a form they can actually understand.

Lawyers can sometimes become too legalistic in the way they communicate.

Generative AI is very good at reducing things to simple statements and plain explanations.

That matters.

Clients increasingly expect simple, clear advice based on their actual circumstances.

Data Security And Confidentiality Remain Critical

The other major issue is data security, privacy and confidentiality.

Clients expect their information and data to be kept securely. Cybersecurity is already a major issue, and AI only sharpens that concern.

In some cases, a client may give informed consent for a particular use of AI and understand the consequences of that. That may happen but in the overwhelming majority of cases, data security and confidentiality will remain critical.

That is why, as far as possible, lawyers should be using enterprise models rather than public-facing models, and they should understand the models they are using, including their limitations, their capabilities, their data retention position, and the scope of both open and closed systems. Zero data retention is obviously very important. Audit trails are also very important, so that there is at least some record of how things were arrived at, even if one cannot always fully understand the basis on which AI produced a particular result.

As long as the lawyer tells the client what AI is being used for, how it is being used, what the benefit is, obtains explicit consent where appropriate, and makes it clear that AI tools are being used in the client’s matter with human oversight, that will go a long way.

It does not stop there. There has to be continual monitoring of AI workflows, continual staff training and continual review. This is not something that is going to go away. The client’s expectation of lawyers using AI will remain a moving target because AI itself will continue to become more and more embedded in legal practice.

Value For Money Is The Real Issue

Ultimately, what lawyers are going to have to provide now more than ever is value for money.

That does not mean everything is cheap. It means the client must be able to see the value.

The higher-level services, the strategic services, the complex work, the difficult work, the unusual work, the stuff that is not routine and not ordinary, will still cost more because it is harder to do and because it requires more judgment.

AI may assist, but it does not remove that difficulty.

The benefit to the client is that they should get higher-level, more strategic advice, delivered more clearly, more securely, and often more efficiently than before.

That, to me, is really the point.

If you are serious about your practice, this is not something to watch from the sidelines.

We work directly with solo lawyers through our Solo Law Practice Tune-Up - a practical review of your structure, positioning, systems and direction in light of what is actually happening in the market.

We also have a range of tools, guides and webinars for lawyers who want to get on top of this properly.

Details are on www.paulippolito.com.au