Ask Paul, Weiss Anything! (2025/26)

[LizzieArthey]

Hi - thank you for answering our questions! Are you open to career switchers?

Hello,

Thanks for your question. Yes, we accept applications from people that have already graduated and started their careers. We appreciate the transferable skills that can be applied to a career in law.

Many thanks,
Lizzie

 

[aspiringsolicitor2027]

Hi everyone!

Thank you for being here and for answering all our questions. It is always very helpful to hear directly from associates and the graduate recruitment team. These are my questions:

1. Recently, I read that PW developed a Legal AI tool in partnership with Harvey AI. Was this something that associates were able to get involved in (from a business development standpoint)?
2. How do tools such as the Emoji Detector and Flash Search tools impact your work as lawyers? If at all.
3. From your perspective, what are the most important skills to succeed at PW?
4. The firm has around 10 offices, which is fewer than most of its competitors. How does this, if at all, affect the work that you do?

 

[afazeli-nia]

Hi Ali,

This was a really insightful response about how legal tech actually fits into your work.

Could you please elaborate a little more on how outputs are checked and identified as being inappropriate as such? Is it usually something that might stick out right away or something that you pick up on when you take a holistic view of the context and all the outputs e.g. regarding a specific contract it has reviewed?

For that matter, how "unfit-for-purpose" might the AI outputs usually get, if you have any examples of when you've needed to ignore a suggestion or revert an amendment?

Classic cop-out lawyer answer but, it depends. Mostly our review fits into that first bucket of very obvious sense-checking (i.e. look at document, look at output, correct inaccuracies). Where I use AI to assist with drafting, it's more about working with the AI output or using the ideas it gives to inform your drafting. Often my end product is completely different than the AI output but a big part of AI's usefulness is that it can get over that 'blank page' problem and allow you to draft iteratively rather than from 0. Where you see that more holistic review is when you are considering an agreement in the context of a transaction. As a simple example, while the AI does a decent job of telling me if a contract requires consent before it can be assigned, what it can't do right now is tell me whether the agreement needs to be assigned as part of this specific deal.

On "unfit-for-purpose" outputs, these do come up but probably less than you would think and are often due to things like the document being a scanned-in pdf. Examples from doc review include incorrect signatory names, incorrect dates or not picking up every provision I've asked for in an agreement. Use of AI in our field is really interesting at the moment because, in many ways, it is more effective than a human lawyer. It doesn't get tired or bored and it doesn't get offended if you ask it to do menial work all the time. I think, as lawyers, we need to make sure we're using these tools in the right way. In practice, I think that means: (i) understanding what AI is good at and what AI is bad at; and (ii) that, just like when supervising a trainee/junior, you have to check everything that it does.

 

[afazeli-nia]

Hi everyone!

Thank you for being here and for answering all our questions. It is always very helpful to hear directly from associates and the graduate recruitment team. These are my questions:

1. Recently, I read that PW developed a Legal AI tool in partnership with Harvey AI. Was this something that associates were able to get involved in (from a business development standpoint)?
2. How do tools such as the Emoji Detector and Flash Search tools impact your work as lawyers? If at all.
3. From your perspective, what are the most important skills to succeed at PW?
4. The firm has around 10 offices, which is fewer than most of its competitors. How does this, if at all, affect the work that you do?

1. I've touched on this already but yes we work very closely with Harvey (and other providers). Through our knowledge and innovation teams, we can work with Harvey directly to pass on feedback and be involved in product development. Maybe I've misunderstood your question but I don't think this is really a BD thing as PW is a client of Harvey here. On the legal side, we do of course represent the usual big names you'd expect on a range of AI matters across the US, UK and EU, with UK/EU matters generally run out of the London office.

2. Perhaps I'm out-of-touch but I haven't heard of the Emoji Detector or Flash Search tools and I'm not aware of us using them at the firm. I generally don't come across many emojis in my work life but maybe you can enlighten me!

3. Excellent academics, enterprising and approachable. You'll know better than me how competitive training contracts are right now and that's doubly so at a firm like Paul, Weiss. This firm has a real concentration of very high-performing people and our trainees need to be able to keep up with these people without missing a beat. Your academics will show that you've been working hard consistently for the past 10+ years of your education. Your extra-curriculars will show that, on top of your education, you are working hard to get work experience, network and learn about the field you're interested in. Being approachable and friendly will allow us to work long hours and do stressful work with you without creating an unpleasant work environment for us.

4. Generally you'll see city firms follow one of two models. The first is that they'll have lots of offices across several jurisdictions. The benefits here are that it can lower internal costs, the end-product is in theory unified and offices can cross-refer work to each other and take on matters with an international focus. The main downside is that you are 'stuck' working with your own offices. This can have some negative knock-on effects such as slower service or local firms being good for general tasks but lacking expertise in niche or specialist areas.

The other way of doing things is to have one office, or fewer offices, and a network of firms that you pick from in different jurisdictions. This probably costs a bit more and you don't have the benefit of everyone working with the same systems and under the same banner. The key benefit is that you have much more leverage as you are more a client than a colleague. I think this incentivises local firms to work faster and provide higher-quality work-product in order to secure your business. It also allows you to pick the best, most-qualified firm for the specific job at-hand in each jurisdiction, rather than being 'stuck' with your own office.

I think PW is probably somewhere in the middle of the road, leaning to the latter model. We have our own offices and our own lawyers in key jurisdictions and, where we need specialist or local advice, we engage local counsel who are qualified in the area we need them and who provide services at a competitive price.

 

[aspiringsolicitor2027]

1. I've touched on this already but yes we work very closely with Harvey (and other providers). Through our knowledge and innovation teams, we can work with Harvey directly to pass on feedback and be involved in product development. Maybe I've misunderstood your question but I don't think this is really a BD thing as PW is a client of Harvey here. On the legal side, we do of course represent the usual big names you'd expect on a range of AI matters across the US, UK and EU, with UK/EU matters generally run out of the London office.

2. Perhaps I'm out-of-touch but I haven't heard of the Emoji Detector or Flash Search tools and I'm not aware of us using them at the firm. I generally don't come across many emojis in my work life but maybe you can enlighten me!

3. Excellent academics, enterprising and approachable. You'll know better than me how competitive training contracts are right now and that's doubly so at a firm like Paul, Weiss. This firm has a real concentration of very high-performing people and our trainees need to be able to keep up with these people without missing a beat. Your academics will show that you've been working hard consistently for the past 10+ years of your education. Your extra-curriculars will show that, on top of your education, you are working hard to get work experience, network and learn about the field you're interested in. Being approachable and friendly will allow us to work long hours and do stressful work with you without creating an unpleasant work environment for us.

4. Generally you'll see city firms follow one of two models. The first is that they'll have lots of offices across several jurisdictions. The benefits here are that it can lower internal costs, the end-product is in theory unified and offices can cross-refer work to each other and take on matters with an international focus. The main downside is that you are 'stuck' working with your own offices. This can have some negative knock-on effects such as slower service or local firms being good for general tasks but lacking expertise in niche or specialist areas.

The other way of doing things is to have one office, or fewer offices, and a network of firms that you pick from in different jurisdictions. This probably costs a bit more and you don't have the benefit of everyone working with the same systems and under the same banner. The key benefit is that you have much more leverage as you are more a client than a colleague. I think this incentivises local firms to work faster and provide higher-quality work-product in order to secure your business. It also allows you to pick the best, most-qualified firm for the specific job at-hand in each jurisdiction, rather than being 'stuck' with your own office.

I think PW is probably somewhere in the middle of the road, leaning to the latter model. We have our own offices and our own lawyers in key jurisdictions and, where we need specialist or local advice, we engage local counsel who are qualified in the area we need them and who provide services at a competitive price.

Thank you for such a detailed response Ali!

Oh wow, that's interesting! I just read about those tools in an article about the firm's achievements, and I had never heard anything like them before, so I was really intrigued (https://www.paulweiss.com/insights/...best-use-of-technology-by-the-american-lawyer).

 

[Hrishant]

Hello everyone😊,

You’v highlighted qualities such as an entrepreneurial mindset, commitment to excellence, and continuous learning as key attributes you look for in candidates. Beyond that, is there a common theme or quality you’ve noticed among trainees or associates who go on to thrive at the firm?”

Thank you.