In‑house legal leaders say AI boosts workload, not replaces staff

Legal and compliance heads from firms such as Eir, Flipdish, Gilead Sciences, IMRO, Mastercard, Uniphar and Wayflyer told Dentons Ireland and SiliconRepublic.com that AI is not eliminating roles but is freeing capacity that is quickly filled with new tasks.

The report “From AI Adoption to AI Advantage” found AI is most valuable for repetitive duties – invoice review, contract checking and customer screening – rather than for research, drafting or high‑level judgement.

Sergey Kinchin, senior counsel at Uniphar, said his view shifted from fearing headcount cuts to seeing AI as “unlocking unmet demand”, adding that the remaining work will become more complex.

Máire Neary, former VP of people and legal at Flipdish, described AI as “a junior colleague – additive, but the lawyer remains in charge”. She warned against experimenting with AI for its own sake.

General counsel Sorcha Nic Mhurchú of Eir highlighted that the main cost is sorting AI‑generated material, not reading it, while IMRO’s chief commercial officer Seán Donegan predicted an exponential rise in queries and complaints.

Overall, interviewees agreed that genuine human judgement is becoming more valuable as AI‑generated content proliferates.

Source: Silicon Republic. Photo: Matheus Bertelli / Pexels.