The legal profession’s singular focus on legal judgment is leaving a critical gap in business judgment, which is the ability to translate legal reasoning into action a business can use. Not surprisingly, AI is making both deficiencies impossible to ignore<\/p>\n
Key insights:<\/p>\n
Lawyers need two types of judgment \u2014 AI is exposing gaps in legal judgment and business judgment, both of which attorneys need to differentiate their value as automation increases.<\/p>\n
Legal and business judgment are not the same skill \u2014 Legal judgment produces lawyers who reason well about the law; business judgment produces lawyers who can translate that reasoning into something a business partner can understand and act upon.<\/p>\n
Business judgment is essential in the AI era \u2014 Business judgment is the translation layer between legal analysis and business action, and it has emerged as a key part of the value proposition for lawyers in an AI-powered profession.<\/p>\n
Every conversation about AI and its impact on how lawyers will learn judgment that is happening right now assumes the profession knows what judgment is. Yet, we\u2019ve spoken to two practitioners who demonstrate how differently they interpret what judgment is: One is talking about the ability to reason like a lawyer; and the other is talking about the ability to act like a business partner.<\/p>\n
Both of these interpretations matter, and both are in the spotlight because of AI. Yet, the legal profession\u2019s near-total focus on legal judgment, while remaining almost entirely blind to business judgment, may be a consequential mistake.<\/p>\n
Significant discussion about legal judgment<\/p>\n
The question about how to teach legal judgment in the age of AI<\/a> within legal education is urgent and well-founded. For decades, junior lawyers have learned by doing, with legal instincts accumulated through repetition and proximity to experience.<\/p>\n \u201cThe whole model that corporate clients would subsidize the learning of junior lawyers is all going away [because of AI],\u201d says Jen Leonard<\/a>, founder of Creative Lawyers, a consulting and advisory service dedicated to transforming the future of legal practices. \u201cCorporate clients already hated it, and now they have a way to say, \u2018I\u2019m absolutely not paying for this.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n The research, drafting, and document review tasks that once served as the informal training ground for legal judgment are those that AI is absorbing the fastest. The profession is right to sound the alarm. AI-powered simulation and knowledge tools are emerging as credible responses, and Leonard herself sees genuine promise in them. Now, firms can use decades of document management data to create AI-powered coaching environments, pattern-matching a partner\u2019s stylistic preferences so associates can calibrate their work before it lands on a senior lawyer\u2019s desk, she explains, adding that, unfortunately, inertia and the industry\u2019s resistance to change have emerged as structural obstacles to this advancement.<\/p>\n Development of business judgment is lacking <\/p>\n