It stands to reason
Systematising workflows using technology is set to be a key differentiator. David Blayney, founder of Associo and a KC at Serle Court, and Charlotte Davidson, Serle Court’s Business Development Director, discuss “reasoning management” and new technology platform, Associo.
It stands to reason
Systematising workflows using technology is set to be a key differentiator. David Blayney, founder of Associo and a KC at Serle Court, and Charlotte Davidson, Serle Court’s Business Development Director, discuss “reasoning management” and new technology platform.
How does “Reasoning Management” improve professional workflows?
David Blayney (DB): I use the word “reasoning” as shorthand for the analytical work that goes into investigating issues, predicting outcomes, and building arguments. For professionals involved in legal disputes, reasoning is the high-value core of the service we provide to our clients.
Many disputes teams have embraced technology to help with aspects of litigation especially with case and document management. However, workflows relating to the core reasoning in a case (including the process of getting insights from documents into the analysis) have changed little for decades. Heavy reliance is placed on recruiting the smartest people you can find and depending on them to hold great swathes of the analysis in their heads or describe it in long text documents.
From many years of experience at the coalface on big cases, I concluded there was a better way of managing these kinds of process. I recruited a team and together we created Associo as a technology platform to support systematised reasoning workflows. We use the term “Reasoning Management” to refer to this.
One central Reasoning Management workflow is the process by which you predict potential outcomes – and it benefits greatly from being structured. Case teams can visually map their analysis in a format showing how all the key disputed propositions relate to each other and, in turn, affect the likelihood of the various potential outcomes. Having mapped the structure, you can apply a confidence score to each proposition, working from the evidence through to the potential outcomes.
This provides a robust and efficient way of predicting outcomes, which is much easier to review and, crucially, to keep updated than the traditional approach of describing the reasoning in a lengthy text document. Better still, it outputs consistent and structured data that can then be fed into valuation models.
Another key use case for Reasoning Management in the disputes context is capturing insights from document review and advising on evidence. There is a systematic approach to advising on evidence, which has been learnt by generations of barristers at Serle Court. It’s based around an extensive Word table in which you list the disputed propositions from the statements of case, describing the evidence identified to date, and indicating what else is required with suggestions where to look for it. As a process, this is effective but cumbersome, and it is hard to keep track of progress.
Working in close collaboration with Associo’s early customers, my team and I designed a tech-enhanced variant of this process: each proposition is managed in a manner similar to the way in which tasks are managed in project management software. A status field is applied to each proposition (for example, “needs work” or “fully worked up”), and recommendations for the next steps are set out in another field. Propositions needing work can be allocated to individual team members. Individuals can then tabulate their own tasks with a due date. This project management functionality is fully integrated with the underlying analysis and related evidence. That means, for instance, that you can easily ascertain and change the status of a proposition from within the ‘map’ of the analysis itself, seeing the progress made in that part of the case.
These are just example use cases. We deliberately designed Associo to be highly flexible, enabling it to be used across a wide range of professional reasoning activities, not only in the disputes context.
Charlotte Davidson (CD): It’s important for business that barristers provide a breakdown of their decision-making methods and ultimately own the analysis on each case on which they work. Recently, we are hearing that solicitors are keen to involve the professional lay client in the decision-making process. Platforms such as Associo not only develop the legal practice service offering but provide a further layer of accountability so that lawyers and other advisers can demonstrate with certainty how an opinion has been reached.
“The great benefit of using AI with Associo will be the realisation of efficiencies while human experts retain full visibility and ownership of the analysis and conclusions. This helps address what I see as the greatest danger of AI: that people stop thinking and rely on it too heavily.”
“The great benefit of using AI with Associo will be the realisation of efficiencies while human experts retain full visibility and ownership of the analysis and conclusions. This helps address what I see as the greatest danger of AI: that people stop thinking and rely on it too heavily.”
How do you see this affecting the way that disputes professionals and others market their services?
DB: There is a growing appreciation amongst professional service providers that the tech-assisted systematisation of processes can improve their services and give them a competitive edge. For example, Ogier emphasise their Lean Six Sigma culture of continuous improvement and their “One Best Way” approach. Clients, similarly, are increasingly interested in whether professional firms pitching for their business are using cutting-edge technology and techniques.
Associo is new to the market and our customers naturally want to get used to it and gain a full understanding of its capabilities before publicising that they’re using it. I am confident, however, that we will in due course start seeing professionals who are using Associo emphasising this as a selling point. Indeed, we have already been requested by one law firm to provide wording to go into an RFP (request for proposal), outlining to their prospective client how, using Associo, they would provide an enhanced offering to that client.
CD: From a Serle Court business development perspective, we are excited by the opportunity that Associo presents. Rigorous analysis and effective teamwork have always been key elements of the service delivered by our barristers. David’s work on the Associo project builds on this and offers the chance for our barristers and collaborating law firms to obtain a first-mover advantage in this tech-enhanced form of professional service delivery. We have already started to see the impact of this in cases where the option to use Associo has provided a valuable addition to the services we were able to offer clients. The platform cleverly supports teams of litigators to work more efficiently, managing live chronologies and analysis in what are often complex, international cases. In the long term we envisage there will be associated wellbeing benefits, spreading the workload, and connecting data in real time.
How do you see this fitting in with opportunities created by Generative AI?
DB: I am cautious that the hype around Generative AI may have run ahead of the immediately realisable value, at least in the reasoning context.
By contrast, the tools, and techniques that we have developed for Reasoning Management can immediately be implemented, and our use of technology augments processes that have been validated through generations of professional best-practice in case analysis and project management. They therefore represent a safer and more immediate route to service improvements than many of the use cases being considered for Generative AI.
That said, I believe Generative AI does have great potential, and we have already started experimenting with exciting opportunities to use LLMs with Associo in ways that streamline processes and the drafting of documents. The great benefit of using AI with Associo will be the realisation of efficiencies while human experts retain full visibility and ownership of the analysis and conclusions. This helps address what I see as the greatest danger of AI: that people stop thinking and rely on it too heavily.
CD: We are keen to enhance chambers’ service offering by embracing new technologies and platforms. This planning, however shouldn’t detract from the crucial role of barristers in resolving disputes. Legal reasoning software could certainly improve the way in which lawyers work with clients, and the output received from case teams, but it should never replace the analytical advisory element of the supply chain. We envisage that platforms such as Associo will give lawyers more time to focus on strategic advice, making them better at predicting outcomes. In the long-term, we hope that the effect will result in improved efficiency of barristers and other advisers to support better wellbeing