Four Trends for Corporate Legal Departments to Watch in 2025

The fields of legal ops and legal tech are positioned for further development in 2025 amid fast-paced innovation on the tech front and growing roles for ops team members.

Legal technology—the catch-all term that refers to a wide range of tools for in-house legal teams and law firms—has boomed in recent years, thanks in part to the adoption of generative artificial intelligence. Having had more than two years to try out generative AI tools, legal departments have become increasingly sophisticated in their use. In 2025 they may be ready to employ more powerful work aids.

Legal ops professionals, usually non-lawyers, typically handle billing, technology implementation and administrative work for corporate legal departments. Their roles have the potential to grow as added strategic responsibilities create opportunities both inside and outside of the legal department.

1) High Demand for Legal Services

A significant majority of legal departments—83%—expect continued growth in demand for legal services, according to a survey of 186 corporate law departments conducted by Harbor, which consults with law firms, companies and their law departments. Cybersecurity and information technology governance were the top top areas of anticipated growth, according to the survey, which was published Dec. 11 and conducted in collaboration with the Corporate Legal Operations Consortium.

Legal departments largely don’t expect the added demand to come with increased hiring, according to the survey.

“There’s still an expectation that the legal team manages what they have with the resources they have,” Kevin Clem, chief growth officer for corporations and community at Harbor, said.

The anticipated increase in demand for services comes with a concern about rising costs, according to the survey. Among respondents, 51% said cost control was a top challenge, compared to 41% in 2023.

2) Adopting More AI Tools

One way a growing number of in-house legal teams say they’ll handle increased demand is through technology. More legal departments in 2024, compared with 2023, said they expect to automate routine tasks, and 20% of respondents said they’d handle growing demand by investing in AI, up from 12% in 2023.

In response to a broader question about AI use, more than half of legal departments said they are considering implementing AI tools in the next one or two years. That number is up from 40% in 2023, the Harbor survey said.

About 30% of legal departments said they were already using an AI tool, typically for document drafting and review, and legal research.

“We’re seeing a lot of redistribution of the legal resource portfolio, and kind of a turn slowly to spend on in-house resources supported by tech,” said Chris Audet, vice president and chief of research in Gartner Inc‘s assurance practice, which covers legal, risk and compliance.

Over time, companies may be able to reduce spending on outside counsel, because technology will bolster the capability of in-house teams, Audet said.

3) Taking on Strategic Roles

Adam Becker, director of legal operations at Cockroach Labs, said roles in legal departments are evolving. Legal ops is still emerging as a field: CLOC, its main trade group, is less than 10 years old.

Increasingly, legal operations professionals are being asked to take on strategic responsibilities like data analysis and recommendations about staffing levels, Becker, a CLOC board member, said.

“You’re not just presenting the data,” he said. “You’re actually making suggestions.”

The ops team needs to understand where their company is headed so they can map out where the legal department needs to go to support it.

“That’s a new skill that I think we weren’t expected to have five years ago,” he said.

The legal ops role is maturing as legal departments are developing “across the board,” Becker said.

“It’s not just about being a cost center, controlling legal costs,” he said. “We’re really involved in things both at the highest levels of the department, more so than before.”

4) From Legal Chief to CEO

The additional strategic firepower of legal departments is leading to changes outside of them, Harbor’s Clem said. Increasingly, chief legal officers and general counsels are being asked to take on bigger roles.

“We’re seeing more and more of a move of law department leadership actually moving into C-suite leadership,” Clem said.

The legal department is already represented in the top ranks by the chief legal officer, but more companies are promoting their top legal talent to chief executive officer or chief financial officer. Clem pointed to the example of Amy Weaver, who became CFO at Salesforce.com Inc. after serving as the software maker’s chief legal officer.

Joanna Geraghty, who became Jet Blue‘s CEO earlier this year, first joined the company as head of litigation. Green Bay Packers general counsel Edward Policy will take over as the football club’s CEO in July.

The promotions are a reflection of the extent to which legal issues have become ingrained with the complexities of running a business. Regulation, risk, and data management are major concerns that are core to the business. Because of that, legal professionals aren’t being asked to “sit in the corner” of the company anymore, Clem said.

“Now it’s like all these major strategic issues that are going on are creating this pathway from GC to other C-suite leadership,” he said.