The Tech-Enabled Legal Function: A Defining Shift in General Counsel Strategy

The legal industry is experiencing a profound and measurable shift, moving rapidly from curiosity to concrete deployment of AI across core legal functions. According to CSC’s General Counsel Barometer 2025, an overwhelming 97% of surveyed general counsel (GCs) now report some level of adoption of generative AI within their legal departments. Nearly half (49%) cite significant operational benefits already materializing, primarily in areas such as contract review, M&A documentation, regulatory intelligence, and due diligence.

This evolution represents more than a tactical upgrade; it is a strategic redefinition of the legal function’s role in the enterprise. General Counsel are no longer confined to providing reactive legal advice. Today’s in-house legal leaders are embedding AI-enabled systems into their operating models to become faster, leaner, and more globally responsive. As CSC’s Chief Legal Officer Ian McConnel notes, the most meaningful change is the interplay between traditional legal counsel and innovative technology, a combination that allows legal departments to deliver insights with greater speed, scale, and accuracy.

One of the most significant insights from the survey is the growing tech-literacy imperative for general counsel. Legal functions, which have been slower to adopt technology compared to finance or audit departments, are now advancing due to the need to enhance cost-efficiency, ensure global compliance, and manage complex cross-border operations.  Notably, 98% of surveyed organizations plan to expand operations in 2025, with roughly half pursuing international growth, a trend that places even more weight on scalable legal infrastructure and automation.

Amid this transformation, AI is emerging not merely as a back-office efficiency tool, but as an enabler of legal foresight and risk anticipation. Regulatory tech-enabled horizon scanning, ESG data modeling, contract automatization and life cycle analysis, automated employee agreement reviews, and other key corporate and M&A transition innovations are becoming standard features of forward-leaning legal teams. These capabilities are especially valuable in navigating an ever-changing regulatory environment, which GCs now rank as their top operational risk for 2025.

What’s more, the integration of AI into legal operations is no longer limited to internal tools. The report highlights a clear shift toward strategic collaboration between GCs and LegalTech partners, as departments seek to embed smart systems across contract lifecycle management, global governance, and legal compliance workflows.

This collective movement signals a foundational modernization of the legal function. As Thijs van Ingen, Global Head of Corporate Solutions at CSC, aptly puts it, the modern general counsel is now guiding the enterprise into a more agile, tech-enabled future. The legal department is becoming not just a gatekeeper, but a strategic co-pilot, equipped with the tools to interpret regulatory landscapes, preempt legal risk, and enable global scalability.

The tech-enabled legal function is now a measurable trend, driven by demands for faster, more precise, and scalable legal operations.  In the current business environment, general counsels are tasked with managing global risks, speeding up deal processes, ensuring compliance, and supporting business growth, often with limited resources.  This shift has triggered an urgent pivot toward legal technology ecosystems designed to deliver real-time insight, reduce manual work, and enhance business alignment. At the heart of this evolution is a new operating model, one that blends legal judgment with intelligent automation and data-driven decision-making. Among the most transformative tools now considered mission-critical to legal operations are:

1. Contract Lifecycle Management (CLM) platforms for automating drafting, redlining, approval, and obligation tracking;
2. E-signature integrations for seamless execution and enforceability of agreements;
3. AI-powered legal research tools for instant case law summaries and jurisdictional comparisons;
4. Regulatory compliance monitoring systems (RegTech) for horizon scanning and alerts;
5. Entity management and governance platforms to maintain corporate records across jurisdictions;
6. Document automation software for rapid generation of NDAs, offer letters, and other templates;
7. Legal spend management and e-billing tools to control outside counsel costs and improve forecasting;
8. Workflow automation engines to streamline internal approvals and task assignments;
9. Data privacy and risk assessment dashboards tailored to evolving global regulations;
10. Legal analytics and KPI tracking dashboards to monitor matter velocity, team productivity, and risk indicators.

These tools are no longer “nice to have.” They represent the infrastructure of modern legal performance—empowering legal teams to become faster, more accountable, and strategically aligned with the broader enterprise. GCs who proactively deploy and integrate these systems are not just transforming how legal work is done, they are elevating the value of legal as a true business partner.

Laying the Groundwork: How to Prepare for Legal Digital Transformation

For legal departments ready to embrace digital transformation, success hinges not merely on choosing the right tools, but on building the right foundation. The starting point is a structured diagnosis of operational hurdles, inefficiencies, and friction points across workflows, communication, knowledge management, and client service. Legal leaders must identify where time is lost, where risk exposure hides, and where agility is compromised. It is important to ensure strategic alignment with the organization's overall business goals, such as scalability, M&A activity, regulatory resilience, or innovation enablement.  LegalTech investments are integrated into enterprise priorities, ensuring they are not isolated.  From there, a cultural readiness plan must be developed. Lawyers and legal professionals should be equipped through targeted training in areas like tech literacy, data interpretation, process optimization, cultural adaptability and AI-human collaboration. Soft skills like adaptability, openness to innovation, and systems thinking are just as important as legal acumen. Finally, effective transformation requires dedicated implementation support, whether through internal change champions, cross-functional project teams, or external consultants, to manage adoption, integration, and iterative improvement. Collectively, these pillars—diagnosis, alignment, cultural adaptation, and guided implementation—constitute the strategic framework for any legal function aiming to evolve into a high-performance, technology-driven operation.  This is not a one-time upgrade; it is a reorientation toward a more agile, data-informed, and future-proof legal service model.

Conclusion: From Legal Risk Manager to Tech-Strategic Business Partner

The findings from CSC’s 2025 report underscore a legal profession on the brink of technological maturity, but not at the same speed or degree. General counsel must now lead not only as legal experts but as tech-savvy change agents, orchestrating digital transformation within their functions. As AI applications prove their value across M&A, compliance, and governance, GCs must shift from passive observers to proactive architects of LegalTech strategy.

The message is clear: the future of in-house legal is automated, data-driven, and deeply integrated into business operations. Those who invest now in digital infrastructure, AI fluency, and smart partnerships will not only future-proof their departments but unlock new levels of strategic value for the businesses they serve.