Legal work could be fully automated within 18 months, Microsoft AI chief predicts

Microsoft AI chief Mustafa Suleyman has joined the chorus of tech leaders warning that major disruption for white-collar workers is imminent – and lawyers are squarely in the spotlight.

Speaking with the Financial Times, Suleyman cautioned that within just 12 to 18 months, AI could match human performance in most professional roles, putting the daily tasks of lawyers, accountants, and managers at risk of full automation.

“I think that we’re going to have a human-level performance on most, if not all, professional tasks,” Suleyman said.

“So white-collar work, where you’re sitting down at a computer, either being a lawyer or an accountant or a project manager or a marketing person – most of those tasks will be fully automated by an AI within the next 12 to 18 months.”

This trend is already visible in software engineering, with Suleyman highlighting how employees are increasingly relying on “AI-assisted coding for the vast majority of their code production” – a transformation that, he says, has taken place in just the past six months.

Suleyman’s striking prediction for the future of white-collar industries, including law, comes amid widespread concern over how rapidly evolving AI could reshape sectors that have long depended on human expertise.

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The shift is already being felt in Australia, where an increasing number of people are turning to AI for legal guidance, with data from LawConnect – a purpose-built legal AI platform – showing it handled over 120,000 inquiries in 2025, alongside 22,000 requests specifically seeking a quote from a human lawyer.

While some voices have warned that AI’s growing role in legal work could signal the end of the profession as we know it, legal experts are stepping in to temper these predictions, offering a reality check on what AI can – and can’t – actually achieve.

Speaking with Lawyers Weekly recently, Jean Gan, head of legal and compliance at Scan Global Logistics, argued that the notion of AI fully replacing lawyers falls apart once you consider the judgement, responsibility, and accountability that lie at the very heart of the profession.

“I fundamentally disagree (that AI will kill lawyers) because it misunderstands what law actually is. Law is not just about producing answers efficiently. It is about judgement, responsibility, and accountability when decisions are challenged,” she said.

“AI can support lawyers by accelerating analysis and surfacing patterns, but it cannot carry professional duty. That responsibility still sits with human lawyers, whether in private practice or in-house.”

Suleyman warned that as AI becomes ever more customisable and capable of driving fundamental change, the world must hit “reset” and ensure these powerful systems remain firmly under human control, serving us – not the other way around.

“Creating a new model is going to be like creating a podcast or writing a blog,” Suleyman said.

“It is going to be possible to design an AI that suits your requirements for every institutional organisation and person on the planet.

“We have to reset that and make the assumption that we should only bring a system like that into the world, that we are sure we can control and operates in a subordinate way to us.”