Artificial intelligence changes litigation practice and shifts skill requirements for new lawyers

Litigators at Massachusetts firms are integrating artificial intelligence into daily tasks such as document review, legal research, drafting pleadings, and discovery, but they stress that AI serves only as a starting point, not a finished product. Sean Carnathan of O'Connor, Carnathan & Mack says AI is a great check on work but cannot replace a lawyer's understanding of the law, noting it can pull quotes out of context or present misleading information. Nicole Benjamin of Adler, Pollock & Sheehan adds that her firm uses legal‑specific AI products like Lexis Protégé, CoCounsel, and Harvey, avoids remote depositions to assess witness demeanor, and has caught AI‑generated fabricated evidence that only a fluent user would spot. The technology is prompting billing changes, with clients questioning charges for AI‑generated work leading some lawyers to adopt flat fees, while costs for AI tools range from modest to $1,200 per seat. Howard Goldberg of MG&M emphasizes that the duty of competence now requires attorneys to understand AI, educate themselves about its limits, and verify its output, likening the shift to the earlier adoption of e‑discovery. As AI can produce clean prose, hiring priorities for new litigators are moving toward interpersonal abilities—managing client expectations, pushing settlements, delivering bad news—and analytical strengths such as spotting weaknesses in opponents' arguments, skills that firms now expect associates to possess from day one. Carnathan warns lawyers will either ride the AI wave or be crushed on the beach, and the article concludes that while AI will not eliminate the billable hour overnight, it is forcing firms to defend the value of human judgment, revise billing arrangements, and make AI literacy a core part of legal competence.

(Source：Complete Ai Training)