Best Practices for Utilizing AI in Your Law Firm

The Florida Bar's LegalFuel Podcast

While the legal field has historically been hesitant to adopt new technology, AI is now slowly sweeping into law firms. Integrating AI programs can dramatically boost a firm’s efficiency and reduce costs by assisting with many tasks including legal research, document drafting and review, and even automated client communication. There is a clear upside to implementing AI, but legal professionals must also be aware of the risks and ethical concerns that come with its use.

In today's episode, hosts Christine Bilbrey and Jamie Moore welcome Damien Riehl, to discuss best practices for utilizing AI in the law firm.

Damien Riehl is a lawyer, technologist, and lead product designer at vLex with experience in complex litigation, digital forensics, and software development. A coder since 1985 and for the web since 1995, Damien clerked for the chief judges of state and federal courts, practiced in complex litigation for over a decade, has led teams of cybersecurity and world spanning digital forensics investigations, and has led teams in legal-software development.

Co-Chair of the Minnesota Governor’s Council on Connected and Automated Vehicles, he has helped recommend changes to Minnesota statutes, rules, and policies — all related to connected and autonomous vehicles. Damien is Chair of the Minnesota State Bar Association's working group on AI and the Unauthorized Practice of Law (UPL).

At SALI, the legal data standard he helps lead, Damien develops and has greatly expanded the taxonomy of over 14,000 legal tags that matter, helping the legal industry's development of Generative AI, analytics, and interoperability.

At vLex Group – which includes Fastcase, NextChapter, and Docket Alarm – Damien helps lead the design, development, and expansion of various products, integrating AI-backed technologies to improve legal workflows and to power legal data analytics.

This podcast has been approved by The Florida Bar Continuing Legal Education Department for 1.0 hour of General CLE credit including 1.0 hour of Technology CLE credit. Course # 8473.

REFERENCED RESOURCES:

• LLMs for Legal Tasks: Best Practices [by Damien Riehl]
• vLex – Your Ultimate Legal AI Platform
• Latest version of ChatGPT aces bar exam with score nearing 90th percentile [ABA Journal]
• AI Agents and The Era of The Intelligent Interface [Forbes]
• Affective Computing: Advancing human wellbeing by developing new ways to communicate, understand, and respond to emotion [MIT]
• Why We Need to See Inside AI’s Black Box [Scientific American]
• Understanding AI Terms: What is a Foundational Model? [The National Law Review]
• AI in Law: Transforming Legal Practices [Clio]
• What is AI and How Can Law Firms Use it? [Clio]
• LegalFuel: The Florida Bar’s Practice Resource Center