The incredible technological innovations occurring in the world today keep life as a law firm IT director exciting. These advances also bring added pressure to innovate and use new technology to add value and efficiency to client services. IBM Watson for law firms is one of the current hot topics in the field, and many are contemplating both the benefits of IBM Watson and the future of IBM Watson in law firms.
IBM Watson for Law Firms: Past, Present, and Future
When Watson won Jeopardy! in 2011, a metaphorical Rube Goldberg process of sorts was set into motion. Since then, innovations, both in coordination and in competition with IBM, have picked up the Watson ball and taken it in new and interesting directions.
For the legal industry, there are significant implications and potential benefits of having the ability to digitize some of the more tedious and time-consuming tasks of the profession.
Researching, reviewing and responding to complaints, and the drafting of standard contracts and documents are just a few examples of the work that Watson and other Artificial Intelligence (AI) technologies can potentially perform at a vastly faster rate than humans, and with better accuracy.
Uses for IBM Watson for Law Firms: Technology-Aided Review
Technology-aided review (TAR) is one of the ways of using IBM Watson in law firms. One of the benefits of IBM Watson and the applications that are being developed on the Watson platform is the ability to quickly process data from unstructured and various sources and provide relevant information and insights for specific, complex questions.
While typical search engines are easily confused by conditional clauses and parenthetical phrases, one of the advantages of using IBM Watson in law firms is the system’s ability to understand more complex language and provide relevant results in response.
Ross Intelligence is a TAR software that was developed on the Watson platform. The subscription-based program allows users to enter a naturally-phrased question and receive organized results from multiple sources. The results are given level-of-confidence ratings by the software and can also be evaluated and voted up or down by the user to improve relevance.
The future of IBM Watson in law firms could well be programs like Ross Intelligence, if the quality of results can live up to the hype.
Using IBM Watson in Law Firms for Document Creation
Another of the potential uses for IBM Watson for the legal industry is the creation of contracts and standard legal documents. While this is a more complex task than legal research, companies are working on solutions and beginning to offer this service.
LegalMation worked with IBM to use Watson technology to create an AI solution that analyzes and answers complaints and reviews and drafts responses to discovery requests. One of the hurdles for using IBM Watson in law firms has been an issue of language and legalese. The developers at LegalMation claim to have addressed this problem and believe they have created a product that speaks lawyer.
While some attorneys will inevitably be wary of trusting technology to draft contracts and legal documents, one of the benefits of IBM Watson is the consistency it ensures throughout a document. Particularly in cases of documents drafted by more than one person, the ability of a computer to maintain consistency can be incredibly valuable.
The Future of IBM Watson in Law Firms
The current uses for IBM Watson and the future of IBM Watson in law firms are exciting topics, and it’s unlikely that there are many IT staff out there who are not watching carefully for new developments and improvements of this technology.
One of the potentially unexpected benefits of IBM Watson and related technologies is the creation of a new job sector within the legal industry. “Lawtech” jobs have already begun to surface as the need for individuals with both the legal and technological knowledge to develop and administer these systems grows.
Benefits of IBM Watson for Law Firms
Some legal professionals have concerns about the future of IBM Watson in law firms. The misgivings might be based in skepticism about AI’s ability to produce quality products, or in wariness of computers absorbing jobs that have traditionally required attorneys.
Advocates of using IBM Watson in law firms argue that the technology will not replace attorneys, but will instead free them to do work that is more personally satisfying and also more beneficial to clients. For example, if one of the benefits of IBM Watson—or a software based on it—is that it can perform research work in a fraction of the time, which frees the attorney to spend more time communicating with the clients or considering creative approaches and solutions to a case.
The challenges and advantages of using IBM Watson in law firms will most likely continue to reveal themselves as new research is undertaken. Rather than replacing attorneys or paralegals, the ideal use of Watson for law firms will add value by offering more fulfilling work for attorneys and better results for clients.