Shifting Currents of AI Shaping the Paths of Law

Jamie Pang and Chung So Hyun, Clifford Chance

The impact of generative artificial intelligence (AI) on the legal industry has been a hot topic in recent years. In the words of Chief Justice Sundaresh Menon, AI will “upend the practice of law and the way we train and develop lawyers”.[1]

Against this backdrop, the Young Members’ Working Group of the Singapore Academy of Law (SAL) Professional Affairs Committee organised a panel discussion titled “Navigating the riptide of disruption – How the shifting currents of AI shape the paths of the law”. The session brought together perspectives from practice, in-house counsel, academia and policy.

The discussion was structured around three interrelated themes:

• the impact of AI on legal practice and the evolving role of the legal advisor;
• the impact of AI on young lawyers and the future of legal training and practice; and
• the responsible use of AI

The key takeaway is that the legal profession is undergoing a period of transition and must adapt accordingly – by focusing on high-value services that AI cannot provide, re-examining the role of young lawyers and their training models, as well as strengthening professional responsibility standards and AI-related governance frameworks.

In this article, we distil the main points arising from the discussion and offer our reflections on what these developments mean in an AI‑aided legal landscape.

1. The Impact of AI on Legal Practice and the Evolving Role of the Legal Advisor

The first part of the discussion centred around how AI is already shaping legal practice.

Increasing adoption of AI and accelerated workflows

There is increasing adoption of AI in task-based work by lawyers and in-house counsel. This has, in turn, led to a significant acceleration of routine work and workflows. Process-driven and repetitive legal tasks such as summarising and synthesising information, due diligence, document review, and slide preparation are now often done quick, faster and more cheaply by AI.

Going further, AI is also used to augment legal tasks such as basic research, drafting, and even first-pass legal analysis.

As AI undertakes such tasks and delivers output that are not only faster but often more accurate than human work, lawyers and in-house counsel are able to process large volumes of information more efficiently and build on drafts generated within minutes. The immediate benefits are therefore increased efficiency, shorter turnaround times and a reallocation of lawyers’ time away from low-value work.

An immediate downside, however, is that practice areas and legal tasks that are process-heavy and repetitive are likely to be replaced or substantially reshaped. This applies especially to the scope of work traditionally performed by junior lawyers, which was central to the subsequent theme on the training of young lawyers.

The enterprise adoption gap

At an organisational level, however, adoption is not uniform. There is a gap between enterprise and individual adoption. It is relatively easier for individuals to use AI to increase productivity, while organisations are slower and more hesitant due to risk and accountability concerns. Such concernsinclude data privacy, confidentiality, and professional responsibility.

Shifting client expectations

Clients not only expect faster turnaround and lower costs, but also increased value-add from lawyers. The profession must thus move from execution to interpretation, judgment and strategic advice.

Clients are also increasingly interested in AI-enabled legal tools thatcan help them navigate legal issues and risks in real time, such as monitoring compliance obligations. This shifts expectations from the mere delivery of advice to assistance in operationalising legal-tech solutions. Lawyers therefore need to be prepared to integrate such tools into practice, deliver technology-enabled legal solutions, and advise on how technology can be deployed to enhance clients’ legal risk management.

The future trajectory: The remaining role of the human lawyer

Looking ahead, the panellists forecast that in the next five years, AI would become an integrated workflow layer. This is already evident from the rise of customised AI tools. Lawyers and in-house counsel are increasingly building domain-specific AI tools tailored to their products, regulations and practice areas. This signals a gradual shift away from using AI for ad hoc tasks and towards deep integration of AI into legal workflows.

We are thus likely to see automation of end-to-end workflows, such as negotiation support and case management. We are also expected to see growth in agentic AI systems for monitoring, compliance, and regulatory tracking. In other words, AI will no longer merely assist in discrete tasks but will become embedded across the lifecycle of a matter.

Is there a role remaining for the human lawyer?

The answer was a resounding yes. Clients will continue to require the judgment of legal professionals to enable AI to produce accurate, apt results. Clients will also continue to require legal professionals to check and sign off on any AI-aided or produced outcome. AI, at least in the foreseeable future, cannot replace the judgment and advice of an experienced human lawyer.

However, AI should cause lawyers to re-think how they prepare themselves for the future. Several actionable takeaways arise from the above:

• First, legal professionals must invest in AI literacy to fully harness the benefits of AI. Legal professionals should also invest in AI workflow integration, not just tools, to improve efficiency.

• Second, the legal profession must re-evaluate service offerings towards higher-value advisory roles. Legal tasks which were traditionally the focus of legal services (eg, drafting, research and proofreading) are now becoming more easily automated. However, AI cannot replace human judgment, strategic contextual advice, nuanced risk assessment, and professional responsibility. As observed in an earlier article, legal practitioners need to reposition themselves as “risk architects” and add value by, for instance, tailoring advice based on strategic risk assessments and helping clients build their own legal AI infrastructure.[2]

• Relatedly, law firms and legal teams should explore opportunities to productise their accumulated legal expertise and knowledge to deliver scalable value to clients (eg, AI-enabled client tools).

2. The Impact of AI on Young Lawyers and the Future of Legal Training and Practice

The second part of the discussion focused on the impact of AI on young lawyers. The discussion centred on how the role of junior lawyers will be impacted by an AI-aided legal profession.

Rethinking traditional training model

As mentioned above, as routine work accelerates and gets replaced by AI, there is a shift in the value proposition. The role of lawyers is shifting up the value chain towards higher-order tasks such as judgment, strategic advice, and problem-solving. As one of the senior lawyers in the audience remarked during the session, given that such routine work used to be tasked to junior lawyers, AI is now a more cost-effective substitute for certain categories of junior-level work. This raises hard questions about how young lawyers should be trained and where they add value.

The traditional training pathways entailed a significant amount of “grunt work”, with learning occurring through repetition. Tasks such as condensing lengthy documents, drafting the first cut of a contract or legal submission, reviewing voluminous materials, and proofreading, were seen as core components of junior training for developing legal skills and judicial instincts. Today, many of these tasks can be completed by AI within minutes.

The consensus amongst the panellists was that repetition may no longer be the way junior lawyers get trained in the future. Emphasis may instead shift to first-principles thinking, judgment and contextual analysis. Where AI now performs repetitive work at unmatched speed and scale, reliance on repetition as a training mechanism is increasingly outdated.

New skill sets for young lawyers

The discussion identified important skill sets that young lawyers today should actively cultivate. They include: (a) an understanding of how AI works and its limitations; (b) the ability to validate, interpret, and challenge AI outputs; and (c) problem-solving, business acumen, decision-making, and strategic thinking.

Rather than viewing AI as a threat, it can be seen as an opportunity for young lawyers to develop higher-order skills earlier in their careers – provided that their training models are adjusted to support this learning.

Some concrete proposals include:

• redesigning training models to focus on judgment over repetition;

• providing experience-based learning for young lawyers – this includes exposure to strategic discussions and client calls;

• incorporating structured AI usage and verification frameworks into training; and

• relatedly, encouraging discipline in reviewing AI outputs, not passive reliance.

Specifically on the last point, there was an emphasis on the dangers of over-reliance on AI – particularly, the risk of skill atrophy. As CJ Menon noted at the recent mass call, 92% of newly admitted lawyers reported that they already use AI in their work.[3] As AI often produces outputs that appear “correct”, young lawyers may be tempted to skip the crucial step of thinking and verifying to spot what is missing, inconsistent or even inaccurate. Increased reliance on AI tools for synthesis may also reduce attention to detail and deep reading habits.

Future lawyers must be technologically fluent, commercially aware and strategically oriented. To hone these skills, young lawyers should build healthy habits early:

• AI outputs should not be treated as the final answer. Young lawyers should actively question the underlying sources and assumptions, and test the output against the facts, the law and clients’ objectives.

• Young lawyers should spend time understanding the client’s business model, commercial context, risk appetite, constraints and concerns.

• Young lawyers should seize opportunities to observe decision-making by seniors, understanding how risks are weighed, why certain arguments are made, and how advice changes when facts change.

Continuous capability-building

Finally, the discussion recognised that it is unrealistic to expect law schools alone to prepare future lawyers for the evolving demands of the profession. This must be a matter of continuing professional education, as AI tools develop rapidly and new challenges are expected to emerge. Rather than relying solely on static undergraduate curricula, the focus should be on ongoing capability-building to ensure that young lawyers can adapt continuously and apply AI thoughtfully and responsibly throughout their careers.

Indeed, there are already initiatives underway to support such professional development. SAL has launched a Junior Lawyers Professional Programme for those with 0-5 years of PQE to equip them with essential skills for modern legal practice, including applying legal tech tools and generative AI in practice.[4] SAL is also developing a Specialist Certification Scheme in AI to certify lawyers with specialist knowledge in “responsible AI”, covering the ethics, privacy and regulatory issues surrounding AI.[5]

3. The Responsible Use of AI

The final theme was the responsible use of AI, addressing risks and concerns associated with AI adoption.

The primary risks identified were (a) errors and hallucinations; (b) over-reliance and misplaced trust in AI outputs with insufficient scrutiny; and (c) data privacy and confidentiality concerns. The panel framed these less as ethical issues, and more as issues of professional competence (including in knowing how to use AI properly) and organisational governance.

Specifically on data-related risks, there are legitimate concerns about the potential leakage of confidential or personal data into AI systems, as well as lack of transparency over how data is stored, used, or retrievable. These risks are particularly acute in legal practice, where confidentiality, privilege, and data protection obligations are fundamental. In response, organisations can implement measures such as: (a) developing internal AI governance frameworks; (b) restricting tools to secure, enterprise-approved environments; and (c) emphasising auditability and explainability to ensure accountability and traceability in AI‑assisted work.

Ultimately, AI does not remove professional responsibility. Clients continue to rely on, and in fact have higher expectations of, professional responsibility, accountability and oversight. Responsible use therefore depends on human oversight, verification discipline and robust governance frameworks.

Some actionable takeaways include:

• implementing clear AI usage policies and guardrails;
• training lawyers to verify outputs rigorously and understand the limitations of AI systems;
• prioritising secure environments and data protection protocols; and
• embedding auditability and explainability into AI workflows.

Conclusion

The key challenge lies not in the adoption of AI itself, but in how the profession adapts. Although AI is not replacing the legal profession, it is already transforming how legal work is carried out. It is clearly here to stay, with its capabilities only improving over time.

The legal profession must actively redefine its value proposition, rethink the training models of young lawyers, and strengthen professional responsibility and accountability. What is encouraging, however, is that the legal profession is already engaging critically with these changes. By embracing innovation alongside reflection and proper governance, the profession can take ownership of – and meaningfully shape – an AI-aided future of legal practice.

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[1]      The Honourable the Chief Justice Sundaresh Menon, Response Delivered at the Opening of The Legal Year 2026 (Supreme Court of Singapore, 12 January 2026) at [18].

[2]      Zaid Hamzah, ‘How to Deliver Higher Value to Clients Who Use Legal AI (Intensively) (Part 1)’ The Singapore Law Gazette (February 2026).

[3]      The Honourable the Chief Justice Sundaresh Menon, Speech at Mass Call Ceremony 2026: “A Profession in Transition – Preparing and Supporting the Next Generation” (Supreme Court of Singapore, 20 April 2026) at [6].

[4]      Singapore Academy of Law, Junior Lawyers Professional Certification Programme (SAL).

[5]      Singapore Academy of Law, ‘Singapore Academy of Law Provides Lawyers with a Leg‑Up in Navigating AI for Legal Practice’ (29 May 2024).