Senior lawyer Meila Burgess talks to Legal Cheek Careers about AI-powered client work, the skills tomorrow’s lawyers will need, and why you shouldn’t worry about following the ‘right’ path
Meila Burgess did not set out to build a career that combines law with artificial intelligence. Today, she is a senior lawyer in the Linklaters Applied Intelligence team, a practice group launched earlier this year that combines legal expertise with AI and data science capabilities.
Burgess focuses on the corporate side of the practice, having spent over a decade practising corporate law at Linklaters. It all began in Australia, where she completed a dual degree in law and science. “I was drawn to both sides: the precision of science where things are black and white, and the advocacy and reasoning side of being a lawyer,” she explains. Her route into law, she says, was “honestly, a bit accidental” and she adds: “I didn’t necessarily plan a career in law, let alone a career combining AI and law, but looking back, it makes a lot of sense: that dual aspect, legal reasoning plus scientific thinking, is probably why it feels so natural to be working at the intersection of law and technology.”
She began her career at Allens in Brisbane, and the chance to move from Australia to a major global firm like Linklaters was “something I’d never imagined for myself and so incredibly exciting”. What has kept her there, she says, is the people – “working with brilliant people across practices and jurisdictions” — and the firm’s willingness to invest in new things, “not just talking about innovation, but structurally investing in it”.
That investment is changing both the advice Linklaters gives and the way it delivers its work. “There are two aspects: the subject of the advice and the tools used for delivery,” Burgess explains. On the advisory side, the firm’s Technology, Media and Telecommunications (TMT) team helps businesses to navigate an increasingly complex regulatory landscape.
On the delivery side, Linklaters deployed AI lawyers over a year ago, in an industry first. These are practising lawyers who are equipped with AI training and then embedded back within their practice groups, where they focus on upskilling peers and using their knowledge of the work to implement AI in a way that delivers for clients.
Applied Intelligence, the practice group where Burgess now works, delivers bespoke AI solutions for clients: “Through our Applied Intelligence team, working alongside data scientists, we can now provide solutions to complex legal problems at a scale that simply wasn’t possible before this technology arrived,” she says. The team also runs a GC Residency, giving senior legal leaders a space to shape a practical AI strategy for their legal function and leave with greater clarity on where AI can deliver measurable outcomes. Applied Intelligence also has a dedicated legal R&D function, building products, tools and methodologies that go beyond off-the-shelf AI solutions.
Burgess’s own focus is on combining legal expertise with AI and data science capabilities to deliver legal work, while a dedicated team handles the broader risk landscape, including regulatory compliance, data governance, privacy and data protection. She gives two examples. Reviewing long-term financing arrangements was traditionally labour-intensive, so the team created an AI-enabled monitoring tool that “maps covenants in complex financing arrangements with the corporate structure to flag risks and identify potential breaches early. This lets lawyers focus their expertise where it matters most over the lifespan of a transaction”.
In mass litigation, going through data across thousands of claims is extremely time-consuming. The team developed a bespoke AI solution that structures the claims and identifies patterns and trends, giving lawyers “a clear picture of the full claimant population rather than relying on a sample”.
The technology has changed her own working day too. Lawyers at every level, “from vacation scheme students and trainees to partners, now have access to tools they can use daily”. Burgess uses AI daily, from prioritising her time to preparing for client pitches to delivering for clients on Applied Intelligence matters, and says it has simply become part of how she works. Even so, the substance of the job is unchanged, and so is where the responsibility sits. “You are still doing the work and you’re still the one responsible for what goes out the door. AI just lets you see more and move faster while you do it,” she says.
Linklaters, she points out, has used technology and early AI tools for years, so the concept is not brand new. What has changed is that “current AI models have reached a standard of quality that supports the premium service our clients expect”. The firm’s approach is deliberate. “Simply giving a tool to lawyers and hoping they use it doesn’t work – changing how people work requires structure, training and support,” she says. Instead, Linklaters has embedded its AI lawyer cohort in a global network, acted as an early design partner for Legora’s agentic system, and adopted a flexible “buy, borrow, build” strategy for tooling. “However, AI is not a magic button. Technology is only as good as the people using it, which is why recruiting and training exceptional legal talent remains fundamental.”
Looking ahead, Burgess says: “AI advisory will become standard practice as cross-border regulatory complexity grows.” She is clear that the technology will not sit on the margins either. “AI-powered legal solutions won’t be run in isolation or as experimentation; they will be a core offering for how law firms deliver value.” Sophisticated clients are already building in-house AI capabilities, she adds, and expect advisers who can match that level of sophistication.
So what does this mean for the skills of a good lawyer? Core skills such as critical analysis and attention to detail remain essential, she says, but lawyers now also need AI and tech literacy, meaning an understanding of when AI is appropriate to use, the ability to question outputs and the knack of identifying gaps. They also need adaptability. “Lawyers must get comfortable with being uncomfortable,” Burgess says. The profession is historically used to change happening slowly, she notes, but both the technology and regulatory landscapes are advancing rapidly, driving higher client expectations, so lawyers need to adapt to that pace.
For students hoping to follow in her footsteps, Burgess has some clear advice. “Get hands-on experience with the technology, be curious, and use it.” Understanding where AI works, and critically where it falls short, is essential. “You cannot offload your thinking to AI; use AI to help you think, not to make you think.”
She also warns against relying on tech skills alone. “Tech literacy alone is not enough; you must build deep expertise in a core practice area,” she says. “The real value comes when solid legal experience is combined with the ability to critically analyse and articulate what the technology is doing beyond the headlines and buzzwords.”
That matters in interviews too. A weak answer to an AI commercial awareness question “simply recites a headline about a news story, a new regulation, or a new tool without understanding its practical effect”, according to Burgess. A great one connects technological developments to specific business impacts, cutting “through the hype to ask hard, practical questions about real-world adoption”.
Finally, Burgess reflects on her own career so far. Asked what she would tell her student self back in Australia, she says: “Don’t overthink what the right path looks like. The most interesting careers are built by following your curiosity and grabbing unexpected opportunities with both hands.”
Meila Burgess will be speaking at ‘The AI era: What’s next for lawyers and their clients? With Linklaters’, a virtual student event taking place on Friday 30 October from 2pm to 4pm. Secure your place now.
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