New research suggests that artificial intelligence technology is altering how junior lawyers learn and develop key skills for their profession.
New York’s LexisNexis Legal & Professional, a provider of legal AI workflow solutions, says the results of a survey suggest significant implications for legal training, mentorship, and leadership.
The “Mentorship Gap” report shows that a majority of lawyers are producing legal work faster through the use of AI tools.
“The data shows a clear productivity upside from AI,” commented report editor Dylan Brown.
But it also shows that junior lawyers are increasingly using AI for tasks such as legal research, first drafts, and document review—activities that have traditionally played a central role in early legal training.
These findings raise questions about how legal judgment is developed as these tasks are completed more quickly or with greater AI assistance.
The report “highlights a tension around how legal judgment is developed,” according to Brown.
The research also identifies learning gaps. More than two-thirds of junior lawyers struggle to develop deep legal reasoning and argumentation skills, as well as source-checking skills, resulting in “ongoing challenges around how judgment and critical thinking are built.”
“As routine tasks change, firms need to be deliberate about how junior lawyers build the confidence and critical thinking that have traditionally come from experience,” Brown suggests.
LexisNexis was founded in Dayton, Ohio in 1970, pioneering online legal services through its launch of the LEXIS platform.
Today, LexisNexis offers Lexis+, an AI-enhanced legal research tool, as well as Nexis, an enterprise-grade database for business insights, public records, articles, and media monitoring, among other tools.
These tools are used by Canadian law firms such as McInnes Cooper. Last year, LexisNexis launched its AI-powered legal assistant, Protégé, in Canada.
With nearly 12,000 employees worldwide, LexisNexis services customers across 150 countries.