{"id":114287,"date":"2025-04-09T16:02:38","date_gmt":"2025-04-10T00:02:38","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/2025\/04\/09\/doubling-down-on-humans-new-legal-tech-offering-banks-on-people-not-robots\/"},"modified":"2025-04-09T16:02:38","modified_gmt":"2025-04-10T00:02:38","slug":"doubling-down-on-humans-new-legal-tech-offering-banks-on-people-not-robots","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/2025\/04\/09\/doubling-down-on-humans-new-legal-tech-offering-banks-on-people-not-robots\/","title":{"rendered":"Doubling Down On Humans: New Legal Tech Offering Banks On People, Not Robots"},"content":{"rendered":"
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<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

After back-to-back legal technology conferences, I\u2019m sorry to say that artificial intelligence is still the dominant topic of conversation. It\u2019s certainly getting better<\/em>, with the narrative shifting from runaway TED Talks about how AI is \u201cthe future\u201d to concrete use cases<\/a>, but it\u2019s still all about the robots these days. So it\u2019s refreshing when there\u2019s legal technology news focused squarely on enabling human<\/em> lawyers to solve problems with more human<\/em> lawyers.<\/p>\n

Legal practice management platform Smokeball<\/a> has teamed up with LAWCLERK<\/a>, the go-to marketplace for hiring freelance lawyers<\/a>, to provide Smokeball users with the power to seamlessly hire freelance attorneys directly within their Smokeball matters.<\/p>\n

When it\u2019s late at night and a solo practitioner knows they need a couple experienced lawyers to bang out a brief over the next couple days, they can now just hit a button with Smokeball to access the LAWCLERK system.<\/p>\n

And they don\u2019t have to worry about ChatGPT figuring out how airline luggage conventions work<\/a>.<\/p>\n

This is the kind of quality-of-life tech feature that sounds simple but solves a real pain point. Right inside the matter management software there\u2019s a button to temporarily scale up when your full-time associate is out sick and you really did promise that client a first draft by the end of the week. If firms are going to scale without Biglaw bloat, this is the infrastructure they\u2019ll need to do it.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s like the Phone A Friend lifeline but integrated into the firm\u2019s tech.<\/p>\n

As Jordan Turk, Smokeball\u2019s Director of Education and Attorney Development, put it at ABA TECHSHOW, lawyers should \u201cgive themselves the gift of help before they burn out.\u201d This feature basically gift wraps it. <\/p>\n

The feature also works in both directions. If you\u2019re the rare lawyer with bandwidth (or a few hours that could use some monetizing), the pair introduces a \u201cGet Work\u201d functionality for attorneys in the Smokeball Boost tier for solo and small firms. With \u201cGet Work,\u201d solo and small firm attorneys can pick up project work between cases, freelance while growing their practice, and stabilize cash flow while small firms work to get off the ground.<\/p>\n

The big picture here is about accessibility and scale. For all the promise \u2014 real or imagined \u2014 of AI, technology can also empower practices to punch above their weight class with human<\/em> lawyers. Scaling a practice doesn\u2019t always require machine learning as much as matchmaking.<\/p>\n

\n

\"Headshot\"Joe Patrice<\/a>\u00a0is a senior editor at Above the Law and co-host of Thinking Like A Lawyer<\/a>. Feel free to\u00a0email<\/a> any tips, questions, or comments. Follow him on\u00a0Twitter<\/a>\u00a0or Bluesky<\/a> if you\u2019re interested in law, politics, and a healthy dose of college sports news. Joe also serves as a Managing Director at RPN Executive Search<\/a>.<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

The post Doubling Down On Humans: New Legal Tech Offering Banks On People, Not Robots<\/a> appeared first on Above the Law<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\"\"
<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

After back-to-back legal technology conferences, I\u2019m sorry to say that artificial intelligence is still the dominant topic of conversation. It\u2019s certainly getting better<\/em>, with the narrative shifting from runaway TED Talks about how AI is \u201cthe future\u201d to concrete use cases<\/a>, but it\u2019s still all about the robots these days. So it\u2019s refreshing when there\u2019s legal technology news focused squarely on enabling human<\/em> lawyers to solve problems with more human<\/em> lawyers.<\/p>\n

Legal practice management platform Smokeball<\/a> has teamed up with LAWCLERK<\/a>, the go-to marketplace for hiring freelance lawyers<\/a>, to provide Smokeball users with the power to seamlessly hire freelance attorneys directly within their Smokeball matters.<\/p>\n

When it\u2019s late at night and a solo practitioner knows they need a couple experienced lawyers to bang out a brief over the next couple days, they can now just hit a button with Smokeball to access the LAWCLERK system.<\/p>\n

And they don\u2019t have to worry about ChatGPT figuring out how airline luggage conventions work<\/a>.<\/p>\n

This is the kind of quality-of-life tech feature that sounds simple but solves a real pain point. Right inside the matter management software there\u2019s a button to temporarily scale up when your full-time associate is out sick and you really did promise that client a first draft by the end of the week. If firms are going to scale without Biglaw bloat, this is the infrastructure they\u2019ll need to do it.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s like the Phone A Friend lifeline but integrated into the firm\u2019s tech.<\/p>\n

As Jordan Turk, Smokeball\u2019s Director of Education and Attorney Development, put it at ABA TECHSHOW, lawyers should \u201cgive themselves the gift of help before they burn out.\u201d This feature basically gift wraps it. <\/p>\n

The feature also works in both directions. If you\u2019re the rare lawyer with bandwidth (or a few hours that could use some monetizing), the pair introduces a \u201cGet Work\u201d functionality for attorneys in the Smokeball Boost tier for solo and small firms. With \u201cGet Work,\u201d solo and small firm attorneys can pick up project work between cases, freelance while growing their practice, and stabilize cash flow while small firms work to get off the ground.<\/p>\n

The big picture here is about accessibility and scale. For all the promise \u2014 real or imagined \u2014 of AI, technology can also empower practices to punch above their weight class with human<\/em> lawyers. Scaling a practice doesn\u2019t always require machine learning as much as matchmaking.<\/p>\n

\n

\"Headshot\"Joe Patrice<\/a>\u00a0is a senior editor at Above the Law and co-host of Thinking Like A Lawyer<\/a>. Feel free to\u00a0email<\/a> any tips, questions, or comments. Follow him on\u00a0Twitter<\/a>\u00a0or Bluesky<\/a> if you\u2019re interested in law, politics, and a healthy dose of college sports news. Joe also serves as a Managing Director at RPN Executive Search<\/a>.<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

After back-to-back legal technology conferences, I\u2019m sorry to say that artificial intelligence is still the dominant topic of conversation. It\u2019s certainly getting better, with the narrative shifting from runaway TED Talks about how AI is \u201cthe future\u201d to concrete use cases, but it\u2019s still all about the robots these days. So it\u2019s refreshing when there\u2019s […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":114271,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[16],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-114287","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-above_the_law"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/xira.com\/p\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/04\/Headshot-300x200-jv5ls5.jpeg?fit=300%2C200&ssl=1","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/114287","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=114287"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/114287\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/114271"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=114287"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=114287"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=114287"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}