Legal AI Lab

George Hannah - Personal Branding in the Age of AI

Personal branding is career insurance for lawyers. That is how George Hannah treats it, and it is paying off. George is a solicitor apprentice at Lewis Silkin and the founder of Best Practice, the legal AI newsletter he started in January 2025 with one viral LinkedIn post. Today it is a media company with a podcast and a personal brand of more than 12,000 LinkedIn followers, run entirely next to his day job. We get into his personal branding playbook: why perfectionism keeps lawyers invisible, why an email list beats a rented audience, and why he posts at 80 percent and walks away. Then the legal AI market: Jude Law fronting Legora, Gabriel Macht fronting Harvey, Claude for Legal, the Freshfields deal and the Gartner hype cycle. And the question every firm is wrestling with: what is left for junior lawyers when AI does the grunt work? George's answer: build the agents. Powered by Zeno This episode is powered by Zeno. Zeno is an AI native legal workspace built for Dutch and EU law. Its AI navigates law like a human legal professional. Secure, transparent and grounded in authoritative sources. Visit zeno.law [https://zeno.law/] and make deep thinking your competitive edge. You'll learn * why a personal brand works as career insurance * how one viral post grew into a legal media company * why perfectionism keeps lawyers invisible on LinkedIn * what the celebrity brand war says about the legal AI market * whether legal AI has reached the peak of the hype cycle * how junior lawyers stay valuable by building AI agents Chapters 00:00 Introduction 02:21 One viral post starts Best Practice 04:49 Email lists and the discipline of weekly content 08:09 From Sunday newsletter to legal media company 11:19 Personal branding is not luck 12:22 Why lawyers fail at personal branding 16:03 Personal branding in the age of AI slop 18:07 Your personal brand as career insurance 22:01 The TBD Marketing LinkedIn leaderboard 23:39 Post at 80 percent and put your phone away 26:06 Jude Law, Gabriel Macht and the legal AI brand war 28:58 Have we reached the peak of the hype cycle 30:30 Claude for Legal, Microsoft and the Freshfields deal 35:47 Access to justice and Lawhive's AI lawyer Lawrence 40:32 What junior lawyers do when AI takes the grunt work 47:08 Portfolio careers and weekly check-ins 50:50 Advice for lawyers finding their voice ---------------------------------------- Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy [https://acast.com/privacy] for more information.

Bjarne Tellmann - Law Firm Disruption: It Always Starts With the Client

Law firm disruption won't start with technology. It starts with the client. Bjarne Tellmann spent 25 years as general counsel at Coca-Cola, Pearson, and GSK. His book "Law in the Era of AI" maps how the changes inside corporations will force the legal industry to adapt or vanish. Firms are posting record profits. But 100% of GCs in a recent Axiom survey regret their law firm engagements. 89% no longer consider them adequate. Bjarne draws on Nokia, Kodak, and Clayton Christensen's disruption theory to show why the most profitable incumbents are the most exposed to law firm disruption. He also offers paths forward. ClearyX funded its own disruption. The gazelle elephant model shows GCs how to rebuild their teams. And a warning: agentic AI is already making autonomous decisions inside corporations. If general counsels don't step into governance now, they'll be cleaning up the mess later. You'll learn * why law firm disruption always starts with the client, not technology * what the milkshake analogy teaches about law firm blind spots * why no law firm has ever gone under while still profitable * how ClearyX funded its own disruption on purpose * what the gazelle elephant model means for legal team design Powered by Zeno This episode is powered by Zeno. Zeno is an AI native legal workspace built for Dutch and EU law. Its AI navigates law like a human legal professional. Secure, transparent and grounded in authoritative sources. Visit zeno.law [https://zeno.law/] and make deep thinking your competitive edge. CHAPTERS 00:00 Introduction 02:15 Why innovation needs ideas from unexpected places 08:50 Record profits but law firm disruption is coming 12:20 The AI factory driving law firm disruption 17:10 The profession with zero curiosity about its clients 23:00 Jobs to be done: what clients actually hire lawyers for 32:00 Why law firm disruption is structurally impossible 38:20 What if tech companies answer legal questions 42:15 Kodak invented digital photography and still failed 46:30 ClearyX: a firm that funded its own disruption 53:10 The gazelle elephant model for legal teams 57:30 Agentic AI and why governance cannot wait ---------------------------------------- Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy [https://acast.com/privacy] for more information.

Tanya Sadoughi - Why Lawyers Should Become Builders. A story on vibe coding

A banking lawyer at one of the world's largest law firms teaches herself Python on weekends. She builds an AI-powered billing tool in a Jupyter notebook. Months later, that tool is rolled out across the entire firm. Tanya Sadoughi is Linklaters' AI and Innovation Lead Lawyer for Global Banking. When ChatGPT launched one month into her innovation secondment, she saw the opportunity before most others did. She talked to every lawyer in the banking practice, mapped every pain point, and built a working prototype herself. That prototype became the WIP Summariser, now deployed firmwide. Today she leads a team of five AI lawyers inside a global network of twenty. Vibe coding is changing how lawyers work. Not by replacing them, but by turning them into builders. Tanya explains what that looks like inside a major international law firm. From hackathons that spark curiosity to agentic systems that solve problems at scale. You'll learn * Why the AI lawyer role should always be filled internally * How a weekend prototype became an enterprise tool at Linklaters * What vibecoding means for the legal profession * Why hackathons are the best way to spark AI curiosity at law firms * How Linklaters scaled from one to twenty AI lawyers * What lawyers and engineers can learn from each other Powered by Zeno This episode is powered by Zeno. Zeno is an AI native legal workspace built for Dutch and EU law. Its AI navigates law like a human legal professional. Secure, transparent and grounded in authoritative sources. Visit zeno.law [https://zeno.law/] and make deep thinking your competitive edge. CHAPTERS 0:00 Introduction 2:04 Will lawyers become builders 4:53 Growing up in a pizza shop in South Yorkshire 9:17 A viral YouTube channel at 15 11:16 Why she chose law 13:29 Becoming a banking lawyer at Linklaters 15:42 The itch for something different 17:35 ChatGPT launches one month into her innovation role 19:28 First experiments with large language models 23:18 The billing problem nobody could solve 27:26 Learning Python on weekends 31:31 The moment the prototype worked 35:31 Hackathons and sparking curiosity at law firms 40:23 From one AI lawyer to twenty 43:47 Vibecoding five apps in one week 46:31 What engineers and lawyers can learn from each other 51:23 Why every law firm needs an AI lawyer 53:01 More builders not more tools ---------------------------------------- Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy [https://acast.com/privacy] for more information.

Soledad Atienza - Why Lawyers Are Architects of Society in the Age of AI

Lawyers are architects of society. But what happens when AI changes how law is accessed, practiced and understood? In this episode of Legal AI Lab, Soledad Atienza, Dean of IE Law School, explains why legal education must move beyond national systems and embrace a global legal mindset. AI makes legal knowledge more accessible than ever. That means law schools must shift their focus. From memorising content to developing critical thinking. From national silos to comparative principles. From narrow specialisation to multidisciplinary awareness. We discuss: • Why law schools should not ban AI but guide its use • How assessments must change in an AI world • Why students must learn to question AI outputs • Why demand for legal services is growing, not shrinking • The importance of human skills such as empathy, negotiation and teamwork Powered by Zeno This episode is powered by Zeno. Zeno is an AI native legal workspace built for Dutch and EU law. Its AI navigates law like a human legal professional. Secure, transparent and grounded in authoritative sources. Visit zeno.law [https://zeno.law/] and make deep thinking your competitive edge. HOOFDSTUKKEN 00:00 Lawyers as architects of society 02:47 National regulation vs global practice 06:18 From systems to principles 09:42 Knowledge vs judgment in the AI era 14:11 Growing demand for legal services 17:36 Embedding AI across the curriculum 22:04 Teaching students to question AI 26:53 Rethinking assessment in an AI world 32:27 Generalists and multidisciplinary thinking 37:12 Human skills in a tech driven profession 41:05 Experiential learning and VR 44:38 Habits future lawyers must build ---------------------------------------- Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy [https://acast.com/privacy] for more information.

Elgar Weijtmans - Experimenteren met AI is geen keuze meer voor advocatenkantoren

AI verandert de advocatuur fundamenteel. Niet alleen technisch, maar ook cultureel. In deze aflevering van Legal AI Lab spreekt Hidde Bruinsma met Elgar Weijtmans [about:blank] over wat het betekent om jurist te zijn in een tijdperk van generatieve AI. Elgar vertelt waarom hij zichzelf een generalist noemt. Waarom juist die brede blik steeds waardevoller wordt. En waarom advocatenkantoren die wachten op perfect beleid of volledige zekerheid zichzelf in de weg zitten. Het gesprek gaat over experimenteren. Over kleine teams. Over sandboxes in plaats van olietankers. En over waarom training, cultuur en menselijk gedrag uiteindelijk belangrijker zijn dan de technologie zelf. Ook bespreken we hoe advocatenkantoren omgaan met weerstand. Waarom vroege adoptie soms vooral geluk is. En waarom AI niet vraagt om minder mensen, maar om andere vaardigheden. Een aflevering voor studenten. Voor jonge juristen. Voor partners. En voor iedereen die voelt dat het klassieke carrièrepad schuurt. Powered by Zeno This episode is powered by Zeno. Zeno is an AI native legal workspace built for Dutch and EU law. Its AI navigates law like a human legal professional. Secure, transparent and grounded in authoritative sources. Visit zeno.law [https://zeno.law/] and make deep thinking your competitive edge. HOOFDSTUKKEN 0:00 Introductie en het pad van Elgar 1:10 Generalist zijn in de advocatuur 2:59 Waarom AI een kans is voor generalisten 4:14 Het klassieke carrièrepad onder druk 6:08 Waarom experimenteren essentieel is 9:20 De eerste kennismaking met ChatGPT 11:28 Verandering organiseren binnen een groot kantoor 13:52 Waarom timing soms geluk is 15:15 Training is belangrijker dan technologie 18:56 Worden advocatenkantoren techbedrijven 21:53 Een nieuw profiel voor jonge juristen 24:40 Zichtbaarheid. Kennis delen. Cultuur 27:23 Waarom hyperpersoonlijk werkt 30:48 De zoektocht naar juridische AI tools 33:24 De trechter. Niet het resultaat maar het proces 36:24 Waarom testen altijd contextafhankelijk is 40:23 Van generieke AI naar juridisch onderzoek 45:22 Richtlijnen en onzekerheid in de markt 48:52 Open benchmarks en samenwerking 51:44 Voorspellingen voor 2026 54:31 Advies aan jonge juristen 55:55 Afsluiting ---------------------------------------- Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy [https://acast.com/privacy] for more information.