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While AI has become the face of legal transformation, Danielle Nahum argues it’s not the force redefining legal excellence – at least not on its own, with far broader shifts fundamentally changing what excellence in the profession now demands.
Speaking on a recent episode of The Lawyers Weekly Show, Danielle Nahum, ANZ head of legal, unpacked the biggest forces reshaping legal excellence, highlighting the shifts lawyers must understand and embrace to remain relevant and succeed in an increasingly evolving profession.
In the same episode, she shared that workplace culture can no longer be viewed as a nice-to-have or secondary concern for legal teams, arguing instead that it sits at the heart of sustained high performance, with culture and legal excellence now “inextricably linked”.
Nahum acknowledged that the definition of legal excellence has undergone a dramatic transformation in recent years, arguing that it now “looks quite different” from the traditional standards lawyers have long measured themselves against.
One of the most significant forces accelerating this transformation, Nahum explained, has been AI’s impact on legal practice, reshaping expectations around efficiency and automating many of the profession’s more routine tasks.
However, rather than replacing or diminishing the role of lawyers, she argued that AI is highlighting the importance of the qualities technology cannot replicate, placing greater value on human judgement, critical thinking, and professional discernment.
“What AI is doing is, while it’s taking away a lot of the repeatable tasks and speeding things up, it’s actually really separating practitioners who think critically about what the technology has enabled them to do,” she said.
“But adds an additional element, probably like the human judgement element, and those who are willing to just pass on the products of AI without considering it.”
Rather than making lawyers less relevant, Nahum said AI is raising the expectations placed on legal professionals, making human oversight, judgement, and the ability to critically assess outcomes more important than ever.
“While I think AI adds accuracy, speed, and polish, and there always is, of course, the need for a human to kind of check in on that particular accuracy point,” she said.
Through this shift, Nahum argued, AI is fundamentally redefining legal excellence by placing a greater premium on the human judgement, insight, and critical thinking that distinguish exceptional lawyers.
“I think it is definitely changing what legal excellence in practice looks like. It’s forcing leaders and practitioners to consider, what value [do] I bring to this task and what only I can bring to this task as a human with judgement?” she said.
But according to Nahum, AI represents only one part of a much broader transformation reshaping what excellence looks like in practice.
Drawing on her experience over the past four years, Nahum identified the relentless pace of organisational change as one of the greatest forces challenging legal leaders, redefining the skills, mindset, and adaptability required to succeed.
“One of the biggest challenges that I’ve faced over the last four years in my current role is change,” she said.
“Because change is really unsettling. Change challenges your ability to get stuff done. It challenges you to always have to reset yourself and face into things that are new, face into tricky personalities, face into worry about what tomorrow looks like.”
Amid the relentless pace of organisational change, Nahum said legal leaders are facing a growing challenge: preserving high-performing teams and strong workplace cultures while continuing to navigate constant transformation.
“That’s probably one of the greatest forces that kind of challenges the ability to get on with your job, to maintain good culture, and at the same time, drive excellence within the team [that’s] trying to manage large-scale organisational change and all the things that come with it,” she said.
