The ProSearch Pulse Volume 8

Corporate legal teams heading into 2026 are being evaluated as strategic value drivers, even when the best outcomes are the ones nobody ever sees. Thomson Reuters Legal’s Kassie Atwood frames the year ahead around four durable goals that hold up under shifting priorities: build and retain talent, prove value within budget constraints, accelerate high-value contracts, and use technology and AI with governance strong enough to earn trust.

• Legal goal-setting remains difficult because many wins stay invisible. Results are shaped by unpredictability and constrained by confidentiality, which can widen internal perception gaps around productivity and impact.
• A resilient planning framework centers on four “North Star objectives”: extraordinary teams, budget plus value, high-value commercial agreements, and technology-enabled operational excellence that holds steady even as the business reorders priorities.
• AI is the biggest opportunity and the biggest challenge. It can improve discovery, research, drafting, and review. It also introduces accuracy, confidentiality, and professional responsibility risks that require clear governance and validation steps. This is where an AI + HI model matters most, with human judgment setting Smart Review Boundaries and AI accelerating repeatable work.
• Outcome metrics carry more weight than activity counts. Track contract cycle time tied to deal velocity, technology adoption and efficiency improvements, stakeholder satisfaction, and retention so legal work translates cleanly into business outcomes executives recognize.

In practice, legal leaders earn credibility when risk prevention and speed-to-revenue are translated into metrics a CEO, CFO, and board can read quickly and trust. Early planning, tight governance, and disciplined measurement turn technology into repeatable operational excellence and, over time, turn legal data into strategic insight.

Above the Law highlights an “Adventures in Legal Tech” episode in which host Jared Correia speaks with Draftable GM Caspar Roxburgh about a familiar pressure point in modern firms: technology overload. The conversation tracks how tool sprawl builds up, where evaluation fails, and which vendor habits reduce friction over time.

• The episode focuses on law firm “technology overload,” described as a steady flood of tools and vendor outreach that can slow decisions and add operational drag.
• Roxburgh compares tool sprawl to unused smartphone apps that quietly stack up cost and complexity, reinforcing the value of regularly inventorying what is installed, what is used, and what is genuinely needed.
• Vendor evaluation is framed as more than time-wasting demos, with emphasis on practical signals like how a vendor runs discovery, scoping, and onboarding in ways that respect lawyer time.
• “Constantly… gathering feedback” is presented as a vendor best practice, with tighter iteration loops that improve the customer experience and reduce adoption friction across the life of the tool.

What stands out is the shift from shopping to stack governance. The constraint is decision bandwidth, change management, and time discipline. When legal teams map tools to real workflows and choose partners who co-design a clean onboarding path and keep durable feedback loops, budgets hold up better and adoption follows. A “Got, Want, Need” audit often surfaces redundant tools and underused licenses first, then clarifies where a smaller, better-integrated stack can turn legal data into useful insight.

An iManage benchmarking report based on 3,185 decision-makers across 26 countries shows broad AI adoption, but limited day-to-day use. 85% are piloting or using AI. Only 17% say it is embedded into everyday work. Knowledge-mature organizations lead on growth, retention, and partner trust. Governance gaps continue to slow responsible rollouts.

• AI momentum is real, but integration is scarce: 85% are piloting or using AI, while only 17% report it embedded in daily operations.
• Customer expectations shape strategy: 57% say customers influence AI adoption, rising to 74% among knowledge-mature organizations. These organizations are also twice as likely to deploy AI in client-facing tools.
• Control gaps are common: 36% report an AI policy violation and 25% report end users using AI with very little oversight, creating measurable drag on responsible rollout.
• Governance issues carry real cost: 20% delayed AI rollouts and 30% cancelled them. The report narrative also cites nearly one-third with policy-impacting incidents tied to unregulated AI tools and almost 30% delaying due to security concerns.

For professional services teams, this looks like a familiar systems problem. Models are the engine. Knowledge architecture is the roadbed. Policies, permissions, and oversight determine whether AI becomes a daily workflow primitive or stays a pilot.

In ProSearch work with partners across eDiscovery and knowledge-heavy matters, the strongest AI outcomes tend to show up where teams align an AI + HI model, set clear operating boundaries, and use practical governance people can follow under real delivery pressure. This is where “Transform legal data into strategic insight” becomes operational.