Episode 193: Future 50 Series – Onit’s AI Center of Excellence

11/06/23 • 29 min

In this session, we spoke with Jean Yang, the VP and Co-founder of Onit’s AI Center of Excellence. The Center is a note-worthy offering from a software vendor. Jean’s journey to Onit seems like it was a natural progression. A former practising lawyer from New Zealand, she has spent most of her career so far (there’s lots more still to come) at the leading edge of AI in legal and, that has now taken her to Onit in Austin, Texas.

Our discussion focussed on the application of AI in legal - how much that has changed this past year; emerging trends in AI uptake; whether it’s realistic to expect definitive use cases right now; and the challenges, opportunities, needs, expectations and reality of the tech becoming pervasive/BAU in the legal world next year or maybe later - it’s hard to look too far ahead in this space right now but we did a little AI crystal ball gazing!

If you would prefer to watch rather than listen to this podcast, you’ll find the video here.

About the Future 50 Series

In the Future 50 Series, we’re chatting with legalpreneurs who, through their ideas and actions, are challenging and transforming legal BAU all around the world.

If you would like to recommend people for this Series, please contact us at: [email protected].

If you would prefer to watch rather than listen to this podcast, you’ll find the video here.

About the Future 50 Series

In the Future 50 Series, we’re chatting with legalpreneurs who, through their ideas and actions, are challenging and transforming legal BAU all around the world.

If you would like to recommend people for this Series, please contact us at: [email protected].

Previous Episode

Episode 192: Future 50 Series – Legal Leaders, Teams, Innovation and Collaboration

In this session, we spoke with Michele DeStefano about how we can approach change, manage it and leverage it for the benefit of lawyer and allied legal professional wellbeing, for our clients, and legal businesses.

Michele knows a thing or two about this from her many roles as law professor, business founder, educator, consultant, and serial entrepreneur. Her work is visionary tempered with a strong dose of reality and, getting stuff done! Michele has been building the foundations, paving the road, and walking the talk of legal ecosystem transformation for many years and, helping others to do that successfully too.

We discussed what it will take to change the legal industry, the BIG pieces of the change puzzle - lawyer mindset, human-centred design, multidisciplinary collaboration and culture. We also chatted about how to combine the pieces in a way that creates sustained agility in a VUCA (volatile, uncertain, complex and ambiguous) world, it can be found in her most recent book (one of many already published with more to come), The Leader Upheaval Handbook: Lead Teams on an Innovation & Collaboration Journey with the 3-4-5 Method.

If you would prefer to watch rather than listen to this podcast, you’ll find the video here.

About the Future 50 Series

In the Future 50 Series, we’re chatting with legalpreneurs who, through their ideas and actions, are challenging and transforming legal BAU all around the world.

If you would like to recommend people for this Series, please contact us at: [email protected].

Next Episode

Episode 194: Future 50 Series – What the future of AI holds for the legal industry

In this session, we spoke with Beth Patterson, the Founder and Director of legal industry-focused tech consultancy, ESPconnect and an Adjunct Professor (Industry) at UTS Faculty of Law.

Beth’s career has the distinctive hallmark of being groundbreaking. The depth and breadth of her experience in tech and legaltech, in tech companies and law firms, as a consultant and educator, means she has a highly practical, global and unique perspective on where AI in the legal industry is going today.

Our discussion began with context - placing generative AI in the broader AI continuum - and moved into its impact on the legal industry. We are all still experimenting (testing and investing) in every industry, legal included, and we should be because there are still major issues with the tech that need to be worked out. However, what was also clear from our chat is the need for us to engage with the tech NOW because it’s not going away, not ever! Senior management in law firms know this (as do our clients) and they’re driving the engagement with it, something that makes this tech journey different from others.

What AI will we end up with at the end of this journey? Beth opines it will be a portfolio - a combination of enterprise-wide tech and point solutions, with commercial models driving the selection of what you use, for what and when. But, integration will also remain key; data governance critical; and capabilities to identify pain points, choose and use/apply fit-for-purpose tech increasingly part of every solution and BAU.

The opportunities with AI in legal are plentiful for those who jump in – new roles, new responsibilities, new practice areas (or expanded), new revenue streams, increasingly refined LLMs that do more and do it better – it’s a brave old and new world which we will embrace with FOMO (Fear of Missing Out) or JOMO (Joy of Missing Out) – you’ll definitely want to listen to or watch this session to see where you fall on the continuum!

If you would prefer to watch rather than listen to this podcast, you’ll find the video here.

Resources:

Thomson Reuters Institute, Edge International, and ESPconnect: 2023 Australia: State of the Legal Market Report
Thomson Reuters, Tech & the Law 2023 Report: Perceptions and Priorities
The conference referred to it this session is CLI’s Legal Generative AI Summit 2023 (24 and 25 October) – you will find the video and podcast recordings here.

About the Future 50 Series

In the Future 50 Series, we’re chatting with legalpreneurs who, through their ideas and actions, are challenging and transforming legal BAU all around the world.

If you would like to recommend people for this Series, please contact us at: [email protected].