How GCs Can Effectively Lead AI Adoption Efforts for Their Companies, Teams

As artificial intelligence (AI) reshapes the legal profession, today’s general counsel are navigating a once-in-a-generation shift in how they lead AI adoption efforts and serve their companies.

The past year marked a turning point, with more than half of in-house teams now using generative AI (GenAI), more than double the 23% who reported using it in 2024, according to a recent survey of in-house legal professionals across 30 countries from the Association of Corporate Counsel (ACC) and Everlaw Inc. As we head into 2026, we can only expect in-house legal adoption to grow.

According to research by the Thomson Reuters Institute, 81% of professionals believe that GenAI can be applied to their work, and 76% of in-house teams expect it to help achieve their goals and enhance efficiency.

Amid this rapid evolution, general counsel are facing both the challenge and the opportunity to shape the future of their organizations around AI adoption. 

As key leaders, general counsel must take a broad view of AI across their organizations, considering the role of AI across their companies and team, and within their own roles, including:

Corporate AI adoption: How general counsel guide their companies through the AI adoption process will vary greatly depending upon the organization type, such as a public or private company, an established or mid-level organization, or a nascent startup.

For GCs of public companies, it is critical to think about a company-wide policy regarding AI adoption and governance. It is key to ensure the AI policy closely dovetails with the company’s interests, ensuring protection of both corporate intellectual property and reputation. For regulated industries such as banking or healthcare, the security and compliance of AI programs is especially paramount, ensuring responsible usage. 

For smaller companies that do not have the public reporting duties and may not have the same mandates around regulatory compliance, GCs should still look to develop a template policy for corporate AI usage.

In developing AI policies, GCs should look to collaborate with inter-departmental stakeholders such as IT and security.

Regardless of industry, public or private status, and maturity of the corporation, AI represents a critical business opportunity, and corporate leadership and boards are increasingly raising their expectations around AI adoption, making GC leadership essential. General counsel cannot and should not have their head in the proverbial sand when it comes to leading on AI. The reality is that the company will be using AI technologies, whether in departments such as marketing, sales, engineering, or R&D, and employees will look to the GC and their team (whether directly or implicitly) to define and articulate an appropriate policy. 

Legal department AI adoption: Beyond establishing general corporate policies around AI adoption and governance, today’s GCs are also facing “top-down” pressure from corporate leadership and boards to deploy AI within their own legal departments, to drive greater speed, efficiency and ROI.

AI can help in-house teams work more efficiently and make better, more informed decisions about spend management on outside counsel.  Surveyed in-house legal professionals in the ACC/Everlaw survey cited AI-led efficiency gains include drafting, contract management, and research.

AI can improve workflow and help deals get resolved and closed. Streamlining the contracting processes and making contracting more efficient is another relatively safe use case for AI to deliver high value from efficiencies and not necessarily create exposure for risks such as hallucinations. 

To begin, I recommend looking for low-hanging-fruit opportunities for in-house legal teams to use AI. For example, GCs may want to consider starting with back-office legal ops functions, which can be a safe place to begin using AI tools.

It is imperative that AI adoption programs take a “people-first” approach. Aine Lyons, Senior Vice President and Deputy General Counsel at Workday, observed that “80% of tech implementations by legal departments are very challenging and don’t deliver an ROI.”  Lyons noted widespread adoption of AI creates a need for significant investment in upskilling, and highlighted Workday’s approach, where each of the company’s 20,000 employees has a goal around AI. For the legal team, that commitment translated into more than 20 hours of training for each member to become more proficient in prompt engineering.

Adopting AI in the GC role: Finally, leading by example is key to success, and GCs will want to consider how they can leverage AI in their own role.

It can be helpful to conceptualize AI as functioning as both an assistant and a thought partner. Envisioning AI as an assistant, look to see where AI can help alleviate rote and time-consuming tasks to increase productivity and free up the GC’s time for more high-level priorities. At the same time, especially for first-time GCs, or GCs with lean teams in their departments, AI can act as a thought partner. This can be helpful to alleviate the GC feeling as though they are an “island,” with AI providing input and feedback, just as one would bounce ideas off a colleague.

What GCs should do in the next 90 days: 

Amid the industry’s rapid evolution, now is the time for general counsel to lean into change, and lead on AI.  Here is a 90-day action plan for GCs to begin making rapid progress on AI adoption for their organizations, their teams and in their own roles:

• Convene an AI governance working group (legal, IT, security, HR): General counsel should spearhead a cross-functional AI governance group to develop policies that reflect organization-wide needs. The group should catalog existing AI use cases and engage stakeholders across the company to strengthen awareness of compliance.
• Draft interim AI use policy covering confidentiality, data handling, and vendor approval: New technology introduces risk, so organizations should partner with security and IT to set data-protection policies. These policies ensure security standards are upheld as teams adopt AI tools, from vendor selection through implementation. Designate a leader to continuously review and adapt the policies as needs and vendor relationships change.
• Select 1–2 pilot legal use cases: Whether for contract review, eDiscovery, or legal operations efficiency, start by piloting AI in one or two focused areas. Consider bringing in outside expertise—such as alternative legal service providers or other specialists—who can advise on tool selection and implementation.
• Launch baseline AI training for the legal team: Take a people-first approach to ensure your team develops the skills needed to thrive in an AI-powered environment. Use design thinking to build a human-centered program, and identify early adopters who can mentor colleagues within the department. 
• Invest the time to scale personal skills and lead by example:  Dedicate the time it will require to make AI tools a part of your daily life, so you can lead your team by example, demonstrating how you are leveraging AI for productivity yourself.   

Looking ahead

It is a transformative time as today’s general counsel help define how to use AI across their companies. By assessing AI’s implications at the company-wide, departmental, and personal role levels, GCs are establishing themselves as central leaders in the era of AI transformation.