Artificial intelligence is reshaping how junior lawyers develop core legal skills and how they are supervised and mentored.

In this episode, Allens’ Lisa Kozaris and Caitlin Dagher share how AI in legal supervision has minimised the grunt work, created space for higher value thinking and changed the dynamics of the mentorship between senior and junior lawyers.

Tune in to hear some real-life examples from inside one of Australia’s largest law firms, including programs to improve digital literacy, and why open conversations about AI matter for building confidence and good judgment.

The episode also offers practical advice about how firms can support experimentation, set clear boundaries and recognise the digital strengths junior lawyers bring to legal practice. This is essential listening for practices big and small developing the next generation of lawyers in a rapidly changing profession.

Guest:

1. Lisa Kozaris, Chief Innovation and Legal Solutions Officer at Allens www.linkedin.com/in/lisakozaris/
2. Caitlin Dagher, Associate in Disputes and Investigations at Allens and a recent graduate www.linkedin.com/in/caitlin-dagher-15450b138/

Host:

1. Karen Finch, Head of Legal Policy and Innovation, Law Institute of Victoria
2. kfinch@liv.asn.au | www.linkedin.com/in/karen-finch

Episode Overview

This episode explores how AI is reshaping legal supervision, training and young lawyer development. Lisa Kozaris, Chief Innovation and Legal Solutions Officer at Allens, and Caitlin Dagher, Associate in Disputes & Investigations, share insights on how the profession is shifting as traditional manual tasks that once defined early legal careers are increasingly automated.

Despite profound technological shifts brought about by legal artificial intelligence technology, foundational legal skills – such as critical thinking, legal analysis and strategic reasoning – remain irreplaceable. Rather than diminishing these abilities, AI tools help accelerate the early, manual stages of legal work, allowing juniors to focus on high-value tasks.

Allens has prioritised digital learning for lawyers, integrating new ways of working into its core legal training programs and adopting both general purpose and legal-specific AI tools into its practice. As the use of technology becomes more integrated into its practice, the importance of open, transparent conversations about mentoring and AI use become increasingly more important.

The benefits flow both ways, and firms can reap huge benefits from today’s junior lawyers status as digital natives who are eager to test out the latest AI tools and confident in applying technology in the workplace in new and interesting ways.

Topics & Timestamps:

1. [00:20] Intro and guest welcome
2. [02:02] How young lawyers’ skill development has changed with AI
3. [05:20] The key to using AI well in a practice
4. [08:03] How AI affects a mentor relationship
5. [10:57] What AI tools and programs Allens has implemented
6. [12:29] How senior lawyers can ensure AI skill development in juniors
7. [14:48] Valuing junior lawyer digital skill sets
8. [18:30] AI skill building compared to billable work

Key Takeaways:

1. AI is changing how junior lawyers learn, but not what they learn, with critical thinking skills still at the core of their development.
2. Including AI in mentorship conversations can make its use more transparent, collaborative and effective.
3. Digital literacy is now a fundamental legal skill, and firms should be encouraged to embed AI training into their practice for lawyers at all levels.
4. Learning by doing is the most effective way to develop AI capabilities.
5. Junior lawyers often bring fresh AI insight and capabilities, which senior lawyers could benefit from embracing.

Resources & Links:

1. LIV Artificial Intelligence Hub – essential and up-to-date AI resources for Victorian practitioners
2. Ethical and Responsible Use of Artificial Intelligence – LIV AI Ethics Guidelines
3. www.allens.com.au
4. www.allens.com.au/insights-news/explore/2025/the-allens-ai-australian-law-benchmark-2025/
5. “Supervising AI” – LIJ article by the Legal Practitioner’s Liability Committee
6. “AI and democracy” – LIJ article by The Honourable Justice Melissa Perry
7. Centre for AI and Digital Ethics (CIADE)

For the latest insights on Victorian legal developments and to hear directly from leading voices in the profession, subscribe to Cross-Examined on Apple Podcasts, Spotify or visit the Law Institute of Victoria website.

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About This Podcast

Cross-Examined is a new podcast from the Law Institute of Victoria. Tune in to hear experts discuss hot topics in the law and the changes shaping the legal profession. Regular episodes will cover everything from AI and cyber threats to ethical dilemmas, workplace taboos and practice management insights.

This podcast is recorded on the traditional lands of the Wurundjeri people of the Kulin Nation. The Law Institute of Victoria acknowledges the Traditional Custodians of Country across Australia. We pay our respects to Elders past and present.

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This podcast is for informational purposes only and is not intended to replace professional legal advice. The views expressed in this podcast do not necessarily reflect the views of the Law Institute of Victoria (LIV). The LIV is not responsible for any losses, damages or liabilities that may arise from the use of this podcast. Listeners should seek independent legal advice for their matters.

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3. Music: Garreth Hanley
4. Copy and show notes: Louise Surette

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Welcome to Cross-Examined, I'm Karen Finch and I'm the head of Legal Policy and Innovation at the Law Institute of Victoria. In today's show we are talking with Lisa Kozaris and Caitlin Dagher about how artificial intelligence is reshaping legal supervision and the development of young lawyers.

With AI tools now capable of conducting legal research and document analysis at scale, we are facing a genuine question – how do emerging lawyers develop the foundational knowledge and critical thinking skills that have traditionally come through hands-on research and mentorship?

Our guests today have experience on both sides of that equation. Lisa Kozaris is the Chief Innovation and Legal Solutions Officer at Allens, where she leads a multi-disciplinary team that is responsible for developing and executing the firm's innovation and digital transformation agenda. This includes AI tools, which are reshaping how legal work gets done and how lawyers learn their craft.

Our other guest today is Caitlin Dagher. Caitlin is an Associate in Disputes and Investigations at Allens where, as a recent graduate, she's now developing the core skills for her future legal career – a career that will, without a doubt, include the use of AI.

Today Lisa and Caitlin will be sharing their experiences, from the challenges to the opportunities, and the practical strategies for embracing AI while ensuring the next generation is equipped with the core skills needed for complex legal work.

Welcome to Cross-Examined, Lisa and Caitlin.

Thanks so much. Happy to be here.

Thanks for having us.

Alright, let's dive in. So, when you look at lawyers five years into their career now versus before AI tools arrived, what's changed in their learning and skills development?

Look, I think the apprenticeship model is still very relevant. Lawyers, as they always have, are learning from more senior lawyers and partners. That certainly hasn't gone away. But what we are seeing is, there is a lot less in some areas of that routine more manual work. So, we are seeing how their learning on the job is changing.

We are also starting to integrate digital literacy training into their learning programs. So, as an example, at Allens we rolled out what we called the Future Fluent Passport last year. And that was essentially a mandatory training course that everyone in the firm had to do – so, everyone from very junior lawyer right up to partner – to teach them things like fundamentals of AI or data analytics. And the goal of that was really to build their awareness and skills in being able to use some of the emerging AI tools that we have.

So, we've really tried to create standalone learning programs like that, but also start to integrate some of the new ways of working into our core legal training programs, which I know Caitlin has experienced in her time as a junior.

Yeah, I would agree with all of that. I think, as a junior lawyer, it's a bit of a rite of passage to hear about the seniors before you doing hours and hours of hard copy document review or, you know, research through the textbooks and sitting in the library for hours on end. So, I would say probably the biggest difference for me as a junior looking to those above me is that I probably am not doing the same volume of that sort of hardcopy type research and hardcopy type doc review, which is a bit of a godsend in some ways.

But I don't think, as Lisa has said, that legal substance or learning of how to become a lawyer has really changed at all. That critical thinking and that apprenticeship model still really remains just as relevant now, and learning from those above you on the more strategic points is not something that AI can automate for you the same way.

At Allens, I know that you've implemented general purpose AI tools such as Copilot and your internal version of ChatGPT called Airlie, as well as some legal-specific AI tools, including CoCounsel and Legora, as well as develop proprietary tools like Chronology Plus.

Can you walk us through what you're actually seeing in terms of how lawyers are approaching these tools, and are there any patterns emerging around good use versus over-reliance?

Look, like every organisation, Allens is on a journey. I think we are all grappling with many of the same issues. But what we are seeing in some areas of our practice, AI and digital tools are being used very much as business as usual.

So, like in Caitlin’s area, we wouldn't think about doing a discovery exercise or responding to a notice from a regulator without leveraging AI. The cost-benefit is so significant for our clients that that's now very much part and parcel of how our lawyers do that work.

However, on the flip side, AI in other areas of practice is still quite immature. So, while it can get us to 10 or 20 per cent of the output that we need, it's still not quite there yet. So, I guess my thought there is, it's not a one size fits all across the organisation. It depends very much on the type of work being done by lawyers, the type of work being done in that practice and where the capabilities of AI are in respect of that.

In terms of what's working, we are certainly encouraging lawyers to learn by doing, and you'll hear me talk about this a little bit today, but there is no better way of getting your head around AI than actually getting your hands dirty and experimenting. And – Caitlin and I were chatting before – through that, you learn what it's good at, what it's not so great at, and it's something that you're not going to learn from a training session. You really need to be doing it yourself.

So, really encouraging lawyers to experiment, to try different techniques, to try different tools, but also hand in hand talking to our lawyers about responsible use of AI. So, just this week, actually, we launched practical scenario-based training around that – what are the dos and don'ts around use of AI, what are the circumstances that you can use it and circumstances that you shouldn't?

So, it's both encouraging experimentation but while giving lawyers guidance around the risks and limitations as well.

Yeah, I think my answer is quite similar from on-the-ground perspective, which is always a good thing within an organisation. But I would say that there's definitely an impression across my team that AI is part and parcel with how you do your job, and I think that being in a Disputes or Litigation team, and having used AI in various forms for quite some time now, our senior leadership in the team is also very aware of how effective and helpful AI has been in the past. So, [they] are very open to using it into the future.

So, I think we've started in my team from that perspective of, let's see how it can be helpful and how we can use it, and so as juniors we've been really encouraged to do that, and I think it means we also already have really great relationships with the people in our legal tech team. So, we are able to start there and do those casual conversations about like, “Hey, I saw this be rolled out, how does that work in practice? I was thinking about using it this way.” And they already have a really good sense of how our practice works, the sorts of work we do, and so we really have been able to leverage that relationship to then use it in more novel use cases, as AI has been developing. And so, I think there's really great communication and great uplift in our team in that use.

Expanding a little bit on that perspective, Caitlin. So, what does effective mentorship then look like in an environment where AI is being used in that formal, more mentorship relationship, and does AI change what mentoring looks like?

I think for me the biggest change with AI and my mentorship relationships has been that it's been encouraged and spoken about in those sorts of sessions. And I guess in the past I've never really spoken a lot about the mechanics of actually doing the task – what are the terms you're using for your research, and things like that. It's always been the high level, like, this is the strategy, this is the context, this is where you feed into that.

But now, as part of that discussion, we've been speaking about how AI might be able to shortcut, or help us get to the beginning point of that really, like, hard high-value thinking, rather than me spending the time flicking through the documents that we need to feed in. That job can be done quite quickly. And so, the same kind of mentorship relationship, that hasn't significantly changed, but more so how we can tweak it, so I get to do more of that high-value good thinking work and less of the, I guess, grunt work of the past that we can now pass on to AI.

And having that open relationship with your mentor in the use of AI – it's not a secret, it's something we use, and we use it proudly and responsibly. It means that you can kind of test the boundaries of that use and where, from their senior perspective, they see the critical thinking start and that baseline background bit end. So, that's been my really big change, I think.

I think that's spot on, Caitlin. I don't think there's been a fundamental shift in what mentoring looks like, but there definitely is an increasing role there for partners and senior lawyers to be doing a few things that they perhaps weren't doing three or four years ago.

One is really prompting and encouraging their juniors to use AI if they are not already thinking about it. Two, really asking them to share how they are intending to use it and, once they have used it, to share the outcome of that – where was it effective, where didn't it work so well, what sort of review or validation did you do in finalising this piece of work?

So, I think there's more of that proactive not only role modelling, but also really prompting a conversation around some of the things that Caitlin described. I think there really is now an obligation for leaders to be across whether AI is being used and, if so, how it's being used as part of their responsibilities.

Lisa, sticking with you, there's an argument that AI could democratise legal expertise by making knowledge easily accessible to juniors as well as your clients, but there's also an argument that AI can create mountains of what they are terming “AI slop”. So, at Allens, how are you seeing this play out, and has AI improved the output or perhaps just introduced new risks that need managing?

Look, I wouldn't say that AI has improved the output of our work going to clients, because our lawyers are ultimately always have been and always will be ultimately responsible for the work going out the door and the work being shared with clients. But what it has done in some areas is help us get to the 50 per cent.

As Caitlin said before, it's removed some of that grunt work to get to that draft point. So, I don't think it's changed the quality of the output, but perhaps we've been able to get there more efficiently, sometimes more cost effectively, and we've been able to share those insights more quickly than we may have been able to do otherwise.

I think it has, in terms of the first part of that question, I think in some areas certainly has made knowledge more accessible and enabled lawyers to get their hands on the right information more quickly.

So, as an example, one of the tools we use is CoCounsel that's closely integrated with Westlaw and Practical Law resources. And just being able to interrogate that in a different way or interrogate some of our precedents in a different way has really helped to streamline that initial work that a lawyer would do in a lot of areas. So, certainly, with the legal AI tools, so CoCounsel and Legora, that has given us a significant step forward.

Yeah, I think I would agree with that. As you were just speaking there Lisa, I was reflecting on how, you know, in the past, you could “Google a recipe”, but that doesn't mean you can make the recipe well. On the weekend, I made croissants. The recipe was great, I followed it to a tee, but it didn't come out very well as croissants. That's actually a really great analogy with the use of AI, and I can put a lot of things into AI – I could put my whole task into AI – but it's not going to come out the same way it would if I had put the thought in as the lawyer.

And so, I think going back to what Lisa said, it can make it more accessible, but what you do with the info you now have access to is really where that value add is, and that just hasn't changed.

Love that analogy.

I might use it myself in the future.

We are all making croissants with AI. I absolutely love it. Caitlin, I'm going to stick with you with this question, as I'm very interested to hear your thoughts, but we know for partners and senior lawyers who are managing the juniors, what would be one practical thing they could do immediately to ensure their team is developing legal skills and using AI responsibly rather than using it as a shortcut? So, from your perspective as the junior lawyer, what could those senior lawyers and partners be doing?

I think first, keeping that open line of communication about AI. It's not a secret. You're not using it in the background. It's something that we see as a valuable tool, but this is strictly the way that we see it, as a valuable tool. And I think really testing, like I said before, the boundaries of use with your senior and feeling able to have that open conversation about AI that way means that they can really help you set the boundaries, and you're thinking about how it can be used effectively versus inappropriately.

And I think the way that we do that at Allens, and probably Lisa can touch on this more, is I'm feeling that tone from the top. The seniors are coming in and saying, you know more about this than me, this is what we are trying to solve, can AI help this, let's nut that out and nut out those boundaries. So, I really think coming from that lens is really what seniors can do.

And I think it's a huge value-add that our juniors are bringing, juniors like Caitlin, who are getting their hands dirty and learning what works and what doesn't. They are able to bring that to the senior and say, “Hey, we should try this tool for that, or what about if I experiment with that”. It's hugely valuable for our client work, and I know leaders are getting a lot of value from it.

But just to echo Caitlin's comments, transparency is king here. It shouldn't be seen as cheating by using AI or taking shortcuts, as long as, really, the ask that we make of our lawyers is to be open about how you're using it, what sort of review you did across the validation. And just having, as you say Caitlin, that really open dialogue with your seniors is gold.

Lisa, I'm going to stick with you. So, looking ahead at Allens specifically, what skills do you think will be valuable for lawyers as these tools handle that more routine work?

Yeah, so we touched on digital literacy skills at the start, so they are a given, lawyers will need to continue to develop those. But, in terms of some of those more human skills, which frankly become critically important in the age of AI, we talk a lot internally about critical thinking, commerciality, strong communication and strategic thinking skills. They are things that will never be replaced by AI, and, if anything, if someone's wanting to differentiate, being a lawyer who knows how to use AI really effectively but also being a lawyer who's really strong in those areas, is what we are after.

But, one of the things that we are also talking a lot about is learning agility, and what we mean by that is, I think, we've all seen technology is developing so rapidly. The way we work today, and the way Caitlin does her job today, may look and feel quite different even six months from now for certain types of work. So, that continuous learning, being open to experimentation, as I said at the start, and being open to constantly learning and being agile. We are all going to have to be comfortable with change, and starting to build that muscle from the very start is going to be incredibly important for all of us, not just our juniors.

Absolutely, and I have to say, it's certainly changed since I did articles way back when, where words like “experimentation” were, certainly not. Experimentation? I don't think so!

Not in a law firm.

Not in a law firm. Absolutely love it. So, Lisa, if you could give one piece of guidance to other firms or law schools about preparing lawyers for this transition, what would it be?

Look, I think creating the space for junior lawyers and law students to experiment and try AI tools, in terms of the work that they are doing. Sometimes we are so focused on the BAU that we are not creating that space, and as Caitlin and I have touched on, the learning comes through doing. So, I would say, I know you asked for one, but that's my first – learning by doing and creating space for people to build their digital skills. And the other is actually just leveraging that great knowledge that our juniors can bring to the table.

As Caitlin said, they are digital natives, they've gone through university using these technologies day in, day out. So, not underselling what they are able to bring to that conversation. The top down in the absence of the bottom up isn't what's going to get us there. It’s those two working in harmony that I think makes the biggest difference.

I think, if I can just add to that, obviously digital natives – that's my big point. As a law student, as you're pitching yourself to a firm or a future employer, you know how to use these tools better than they do, and you're willing to use that and critically think about how to use it.

But my other thing – and this may be talking a bit out of turn – but what I would really encourage firms to, and I think something we've done really well at Allens – is put your money where your mouth is when it comes to experimenting with these AI tools. And what I mean by that is, seeing the contribution to that experimentation the same way you would billable work.

And we have recently, and Lisa and I spoke a bit off mic about this before today, done this Disputes and Investigations “sprint” towards the end of last year, where if you participated in the sprint you could record it to your billable time, treat it as seriously as you would any other matter work, and really start to think about what use cases AI or our various kind of AI tools can be used for to help speed up that BAU work.

And by putting that, I guess, time and investment into your juniors doing that experimentation, it means we are able to get some really, really great outputs out. And so, you're not just spitting the, “Yes, we are open to trying this, we are interested, we've subscribed to all the tools” – actually putting that time and value into experimenting, I think really makes the difference, so I would encourage that too.

Yeah, for us that was really important. We wanted to signal to our lawyers that this is as important as billable work. Helping them to build their AI skills not only helps them as professionals, but ultimately helps our clients, so hence we set up these AI sprints, so that our lawyers would get billable credit for that time, and we had some really great engagement off the back of that.

Well Lisa and Caitlin, we've only just scratched the surface, I think I could talk to you for another hour or so, but unfortunately that's all we have time for today. So, thank you so much to both of you for joining us and sharing your stories and insights.

And thank you to everyone that's listened to Cross-Examined today. You'll find links to the resources from the Law Institute of Victoria and everything we've mentioned today in the show notes below.

If you found this episode useful, please share it with your colleagues and don't forget to subscribe wherever you listen, so you don't miss out on future episodes. And until next time, thanks for listening to Cross-Examined.