Start with the work the firm wants help with.
Legal AI products differ more in what they connect to than in how well they write. Before comparing them, list the tasks the firm wants help with: legal research, first drafts of letters and motions, summaries of depositions and productions, contract review, correspondence, or intake. Note who does each task today and how often it comes up.
For each task, note where its inputs live. Research depends on the service the firm subscribes to. Drafting depends on templates and past work in the document system. Summaries depend on matter files. Correspondence lives in Outlook. The tool that fits is the one that can reach those inputs under the firm’s access rules.
Also write down what the firm will not do with AI, at least at first: sending anything to a client without review, filing without a lawyer reading every cited authority, or putting client information into tools without written data terms. Those limits shape the shortlist as much as the features do.
Know the main kinds of legal AI tool.
Research platforms with AI built in, such as CoCounsel on Westlaw and Lexis+ with Protégé, answer questions from the publisher’s research content and link to sources lawyers already use. Firms that subscribe to one of these services often begin there, because citations lead back to familiar material.
Legal AI platforms such as Harvey offer assistants, document workspaces, and workflows across research, drafting, and review, and work inside Word and Outlook. Practice management vendors have added AI to their systems, including Clio Work, Smokeball, Filevine, and MyCase, which suits firms that want AI next to their matters and documents. General assistants such as Microsoft Copilot cover everyday drafting and email.
A tailored system is a further option when the firm needs AI to work from its prior briefs, templates, and matters in ways a product does not support, or wants specific checks, such as confirming every citation before a draft is shown. Products and their features change often, so confirm current capabilities and terms with each vendor before deciding. Baybloom is independent of the vendors named in this guide.
Compare tools on the firm’s real tasks.
Ask each vendor for a trial and run the same tasks through each tool using matters the firm has already closed, with client information handled under the trial’s data terms or removed. Have the lawyers who do the work judge the results, and check every citation in the output against its source.
Compare what matters in practice: whether answers cite sources lawyers can open, how well the citations hold up, how closely the tool follows the firm’s templates, whether it works in Word and Outlook, and how it connects to the document and practice systems. Note the setup each tool needs before it is useful.
Review the data terms with the same care: where data is stored, whether the vendor uses firm data to train models, how long inputs are kept, who at the vendor can access them, and what happens to data if the firm leaves. Get the answers in the contract or the vendor’s written terms, not only in a sales conversation.
Roll out with connections, workflows, and training by role.
A license gives people access; a rollout makes the tool useful. Connect it to the document and practice systems where the vendor supports that, check that access follows matter permissions and ethical walls, and test with accounts from different roles.
Set up workflows for the tasks each practice group repeats: saved prompts, templates, and multi-step processes for deposition summaries, discovery responses, contract review, or client updates. Start with one practice group, refine the workflows with the people who use them, then extend to the next group.
Train by role. Partners need to know how to supervise and review AI-assisted work. Associates and paralegals need the workflows and the verification steps. Staff need to know what they may use the tool for and what stays off limits. Short written guides and a named person for questions keep use going after the first sessions.
Adopt a written AI use policy before use spreads.
A policy turns individual judgment into firm practice. It names the approved tools and the work each may be used for, the client information that may be used and how it is protected, how output is verified, when clients are told about AI use, how fees reflect AI-assisted work, and who supervises.
ABA Formal Opinion 512 is a useful starting point. It addresses competence, confidentiality, communication with clients, supervision, and fees in the use of generative AI, and state bars have issued guidance as well. The firm’s policy should reflect the rules where its lawyers practice, and it should be reviewed when tools, guidance, or the firm’s use changes.
This guide is educational, not legal or ethics advice; the firm’s lawyers should review any policy against the rules that apply to them and adopt it as their decision. Baybloom helps firms roll out the tools they already license, with connections, workflows, a draft policy for the firm to review, and training, and builds tailored systems where a product does not fit the work.
Put it into practice
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