From lawyer to legal engineer

Alex Fortescue-Webb, who leads both Legal Engineering and the UK market for Legora, never set out to be a technologist. Yet today he’s shaping a critically important role at the intersection of law and AI.

“I started out as a lawyer but quickly became curious about how the work could be done better,” he recalls. Frustration with the brute force approach to certain aspects of the work pushed him toward innovation. Early experiments with machine learning tools felt promising but ultimately only partially delivered. The real turning point was GPT-3.5:

“It was immediately clear that the ability this technology had to work with language would be transformational for the legal profession.”

When Alex first met Legora co-founder Max Junestrand in early 2024, the platform was still in a formative phase – but crucially it was the result of engineers and lawyers working side by side.

“It was technology that aligned the capabilities of large language models with the day-to-day work of a lawyer, rather than a chatbot with a system prompt instructing it to act like one. The pace at which the development team was able to build and incorporate feedback was the other decisive factor. It felt like the trajectory was extremely steep.”

A hybrid role for a hybrid future

The term “legal engineer” is still relatively new, but the function is fast becoming one of the most important in law. As the sector pivots to embrace AI, legal engineers smooth the interface between technology and practice. They ensure that human expertise and judgment remain central, while turning the theoretical promise of AI into a dependable part of lawyers’ working lives.

“Legal engineers are the people enabling and accelerating this industry-wide change by working directly alongside lawyers, making sure lessons from smaller experiments become the foundation for adoption at scale and reducing the resistance that can come with change," 

Alex says:

“It’s a hybrid. The strongest legal engineers can zoom into the detail of a specific workflow, then zoom out to see the broader organisational picture and design an adoption plan for the entire team, or even firm.”

Why legal engineers matter today

Previous waves of legal technology slotted quietly into existing processes or sat with specialised support teams. Generative AI is different, with the potential to reshape every lawyer’s workflow. That demands a more holistic shift in ways of working. Adoption is less about installing software that will work in the background, and more about orchestrating behavioural change at scale. 

“There is potential to enhance almost every workflow of every lawyer in a firm or an in-house team," Alex observes. "That’s completely unprecedented.”

This scale of change comes with two pressing realities:

• Lawyers are time-poor. They cannot spend hours experimenting with new systems. Trust and value need to be visible quickly, under real-world conditions. “If a lawyer burns an hour unsuccessfully testing an AI tool, that may be felt to be inefficient. We need to help them see immediate, tangible results,” stresses Alex. 

• Adoption is uneven. Within any firm, some partners are early enthusiasts, while others remain more cautious. Experience and comfort levels with AI vary dramatically. Legal engineers bridge those gaps with tailored enablement – from general education, to practice-specific training, to one-on-one coaching with champions.

This is why the role is more than traditional SaaS solutions consulting. It is about guiding structured change programs, reducing friction, and embedding AI in ways lawyers can rely on.

The result is not just smoother deployment, but genuine transformation: lawyers confident enough to use AI in their day-to-day work, and firms able to scale those gains across practice areas.

How Legora works with partners

For firms adopting AI, consistency and organisational understanding matters. At Legora, client partnership goes beyond deployment. Legal engineers stay embedded from the first pilot through all implementation activities. That continuity means the same people who design and test new workflows also support their wider deployment, reducing duplication of effort and building trust.

“All the lessons learned during a pilot – what works for this firm, its unique dynamics – don’t need to be relearned,” Alex explains. “The same people carry them forward, so adoption is accelerated and feels natural from day one.”

Larger rollouts also need flexibility. The platform itself remains consistent, but the implementation program flexes. Some firms prefer an emphasis on top-down training; others move practice by practice or even lawyer by lawyer. The operating model is a hub-and-spoke: a core Legora team runs the overall program, while subject-matter experts are pulled in to support specific teams, practice groups or jurisdictions.

“Clients tell us that what sets Legora’s legal engineers apart is the way they embed deeply, bring mature frameworks, and focus on solving problems. That proximity builds trust and accelerates adoption."

“The point is making it feel like a natural extension of the way that firm works,” Alex adds.

Engineering the future of practice

Legal engineering is still taking shape as a discipline, and will continue to evolve in such a fast moving space. It will always sit at the intersection of law, technology, and change management – and be a role defined by breadth rather than specialisation.

As Alex puts it:

“Legora emphasises outcomes. Our legal engineers are valued because they arrive equipped to listen, adapt, and deliver adoption programs that endure.”

And their work is only just beginning. As AI becomes embedded across more aspects of legal work, legal engineers will play a defining role in ensuring the technology enables not just efficiency, but also enables lawyers to deliver much deeper strategic value.