Technology

Junior Lawyers Are Going Extinct And Nobody Knows What To Do About It

Technology will reduce the market for junior attorneys and that carries with it some significant ripple effects.

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Every time I’m asked to comment on the impact technology will have on the legal profession, I always focus on the same problem: the death of the junior attorney. Robots are not replacing elite litigators any time soon, but what they will do is grease the wheels of the legal process and alleviate all the mindless grind that typically occupies junior associates.

And that’s a problem for the profession because law firms and law schools have partnered to pawn off all actual professional training to the firms and when those firms start hiring fewer junior attorneys, that means there are fewer lawyers entering the cursus honorum to learn how to be the next generation of elite senior lawyers. Nothing is being done to address this looming disaster.

Professor John Flood of Griffith University in Queensland, Australia also sees this danger. In a new academic paper titled, “Legal Professionals of the Future: Their Ethos, Role and Skills,” he writes:

The effect of automation here could be dramatic in that if junior associates were to be gradually culled from firms, the entire reproduction of the legal profession could be jeopardised since law firms are structured around associates being promoted to partnership…

Exactly. Sooner rather than later, firms are going to slow their junior hiring and focus on a narrower range of candidates. Unfortunately, the path to building a great lawyer is a pyramid scheme and it’s harder to guarantee good results when there are less bodies in the system getting tested for their professional acumen.

Moreover, screwing up the most basic tasks is a critical part of becoming a well-seasoned attorney. What happens when we lose those tasks to throw at a first-year? What replaces that hands-on education?

Legal Cheek cites a Law Society study that estimates:

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Over the longer term, the number of jobs in the legal services sector will be increasingly affected by automation of legal services functions. This could mean that by 2038 total employment in the sector could be 20% less than it would otherwise have been, with a loss of 78,000 jobs — equal to 67,000 full-time equivalent jobs — compared to if productivity growth continued at its current rate.

Gloom and doom over unemployment is usually misplaced. Jobs tend to just get shifted — more firm lawyers become freelance attorneys or join non-traditional legal services companies, for example. But if the training regime for young lawyers isn’t addressed, the population of competent attorneys to fill these new gigs will simply dry up.

Firms and law schools need to start taking this challenge seriously because life comes at you fast, and the profession could face its existential crisis sooner than folks realize.

Junior lawyers ‘endangered species’ due to automation, law prof claims [Legal Cheek]

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HeadshotJoe Patrice is a senior editor at Above the Law and co-host of Thinking Like A Lawyer. Feel free to email any tips, questions, or comments. Follow him on Twitter if you’re interested in law, politics, and a healthy dose of college sports news. Joe also serves as a Managing Director at RPN Executive Search.

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