The pandemic has altered the lives for everyone and a recent report in the Financial Times highlights how lawyers have been forced into their digital future faster than they might have imagined.
While lawyers and accountants have often been immune to rapid technological change, that too is changing rapidly. They are now entering a new era of rapid legal-tech change.
And Law.com reported on the cuts in IT budgets for major firms in the US who were, however, not limiting their IT development but accelerating it.
As Brett Burney of Burney Consultants said current IT budget cuts aren’t as severe as the ones he saw during the Great Recession and part of the reason is that at present technology isn’t just essential to a law firm’s business, but also its ability to continue operating through a pandemic. Indeed, IT budgets have been redirected to a new pressing priority: transitioning to a remote workforce.
Although the lockdowns and working from home trends lessened the impact of the change, it has accelerated the use of online technologies at an unprecedented pace for a variety of areas, health services being a principal one but there are many others like online shopping too, but lawyers are now ready to follow the trend.
Wolfgang Münchau, Financial Times European commentator, recently dubbed Covid-19 the “end of the analogue era”, to explain the shift from technology as a support function to the use of, say, mobile phones as producers of real-time data.
As lawyers and accountants deal mainly in knowledge rather than products, according to author David Moschella, and that focus — and healthy profit margins — has in many cases protected them from being forced to overhaul their business models entirely.
The incursion of machine learning and artificial intelligence into legal departments puts lawyers in the “foothills” of profound change, says author and government adviser Richard Susskind, a well known commentator and legal industry ‘futurist’.
The big digital shift that took place between 2006 and 2016 concerned moving from ownership models to sharing and streaming, cloud-based computing and the development of apps using location services such as taxi-hailing service Uber and food delivery services online.
But the current phase is more drastic, according to Mr Moschella, and will have a more radical effect on the business of law. “The first two waves [of disruptive innovation] haven’t been strong enough to reshape the professions, but we think the third most likely will,” he said in a 2017 report.
Commoditised Legal Services
The commoditisation of legal services has largely been driven by the Big Four accounting firms, which has in turn placed pressure on the law firms to increasingly use software and technology to develop their services too.
However the law firms have used technology to better deliver legal services that they have traditionally offered by ‘grafting’ technology onto what has already been offered.
However technological barriers remain for law firms. The recent report from PwC found that the adoption of digital and emerging technologies had advanced further in the legal sector with several firms establishing “some form of mobile apps, automated document production, data visualisation, AI, and smart contracts, as the report showed.
Robert Shooter, head of technology at London-based law firm Fieldfisher, says: “We’re a traditional lot and cultural change — which is so important if we want our lawyers to adopt the use of innovative tech — is exceptionally difficult. People like doing things the way they’ve been doing them for generations.”
- Average Lawyer Salary 2026: BLS Data by State, Practice Area & Experience
If you are a lawyer reviewing your options in 2026, the latest data from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) and major legal compensation surveys makes one thing clear: location, specialty, and experience still dictate everything. The national median lawyer salary stands at $151,160 as of the BLS Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics (OEWS) survey for May 2024 — the most recent official release — with approximately 747,750 lawyers in paid employment across the country. The national mean wage for lawyers is $182,760, reflecting how strongly the top earners pull the average upward. Log in for the full report . . - $12 Million Paydays, a $10 Billion Firm, and Biglaw’s Best Run in Years
A decade ago, $6 million was considered a breathtaking partner payday at a top US law firm. Today, that figure barely cracks the Am Law 100’s top ten. The 2026 Am Law 100 rankings, reflecting 2025 financial performance, tell the story of an industry that has fundamentally reset what “profitable” means: $178.95 billion in aggregate revenues, a $12.15 million average payout for equity partners at Wachtell Lipton, and Kirkland & Ellis becoming the first law firm in history to surpass $10 billion in annual revenue. The rich got richer, the gap widened, and almost nobody at the top is apologising for it. Read the LawFuel review of the AmLaw 100 – login - Musk v Altman: The Lawyers Running the Biggest AI Trial on Earth | LawFuel
The Musk v Altman trial is being sold as a grudge match between two tech billionaires over the future of artificial intelligence. But the real contest is between two skilled commercial litigators. Elon Musk has turned to New York trial lawyer Steven Molo of MoloLamken who delivered his opening statement in Oakland to a nine-person jury on April 28, 2026 with Morgan Chu of Irell & Manella’s Los Angeles office playing a supporting role having been lead counsel on Musk’s original state court filings. Log in to read the article . . - Private Equity MSO Deal Lawyers – The Holland & Knight Lawyers Closing 15+ Law Firm Transactions in Six Months
- Lateral Hiring Surges 16.4% in 2025: Small Firms Crush It With 44% Growth as Talent Wars Accelerate
The U.S. law firm lateral market shows healthy expansion and also provides a strategic shift toward senior leverage and a surprising surge at smaller firms. According to the National Association for Law Placement (NALP) 2025 Survey of Law Firms on Lateral and 3L Hiring (released April 22, 2026), total lateral hiring volume rose 16.4% year-over-year among the 305 offices/firms reporting comparable data. Log in to read more . . - Sullivan & Cromwell Joins the AI Hall of Shame — and the Irony Is Exquisite
- LawFuel’s Legal AI Power List 2026
