Regulatory complexity, economic uncertainty, geopolitical concerns and ESG reporting are just some of the challenges fundamentally shifting the responsibilities of in-house legal teams around the world today. The latest KPMG Law report explores why tech-led teams will be the future of in-house legal services, helping businesses to respond effectively to a wide-range of issues. In today’s blog, we break down our key takeaways from the report.

1. GCs are taking on greater responsibilities when it comes to risk management and governance. Maintaining compliance with everything from ESG mandates to economic sanctions has become mission-critical for almost every business. Legal teams now play a central role in protecting a company’s reputation whilst also maintaining their competitive edge in the market. As a result, GCs are increasingly viewed as an essential member of the C-suite, as businesses try to strike a balance between competitiveness and risk. After all, GCs provide more than legal counsel – they’re also business enablers. Ensuring the right technology is at their fingertips is essential to helping them take on these responsibilities. Just one example pointed out in the KPMG Law report is how the broadened priorities of legal departments require complete oversight of a company’s contractual landscape. Luminance’s AI Insights Screen is an example of how GCs and executives can successfully take on these evolving responsibilities. The AI-powered insights screen provide executives with key contractual and business information across a series of interactive widgets, at a glance.

2. The report noted that “AI solutions are likely to further transform the market for legal services”. AI presents the next evolution in how we all work. For legal teams, this means the automation of high-volume, routine administrative tasks like the review of standard NDAs or contract drafting, which consumes invaluable hours of a lawyer’s day. With Luminance, teams can augment these tasks with AI and have more time in their day to focus on strategic and creative work. Lawyers who’ve spent years receiving specialised training want to spend their time executing specialised work, which require their expertise and creativity – it is those skills that makes lawyers so valuable within businesses.

3. Collaboration is key to a successful business. The right tech enables legal teams to facilitate cross-team collaboration and drive better business outcomes. If non-legal teams like Sales and Procurement are provided with direct access to legal expertise (e.g. by being empowered to create standardised contracts, with terms pre-approved by legal), businesses can rapidly reduce contract bottlenecks caused by manual legal query handling and drive efficiency into the commercial process. We’re seeing this at Luminance, with global corporations such as Koch Industries using Luminance’s Legal Helpdesk to enable its legal team to answer questions quickly and efficiently. As correctly pointed out in the report, tech can transform legal departments to a solutions-oriented team.

What could a tech-led legal department do for your business? Find out here