Putting it together · for legal and compliance professionals
Building AI workflows in legal and compliance work
A single prompt can summarize one contract. An in-house team handling dozens of vendor agreements a month, or a due diligence data room with hundreds of documents, needs more than that. It needs intake, triage, review, escalation, and a record of what was checked. One prompt doing all of that does each part poorly.
Putting it together means splitting recurring legal work into stages, using the right tool for each, and placing a qualified human review where judgment is required. The result is a process the team can run, audit, and improve.
Where it comes up
Contract intake and triage
A saved prompt extracts parties, term, value, governing law, and key clauses from each incoming agreement. A lawyer reviews the extraction and routes each contract to standard handling or escalation.
Due diligence document review
Each document in a data room goes through the same extraction template, such as change of control, assignment, and exclusivity. Every flagged item is checked against the document before it enters the findings report.
Regulatory change monitoring
New guidance and rule changes are summarized against a fixed template that asks who is affected, what changes, and by when. A compliance lead decides which items need action.
What it looks like at each band
E1 · Foundational
Uses AI for single tasks and connects the steps by hand. Each matter starts with a new prompt. Results vary from one matter to the next.
E2 · Proficient
Runs recurring work as a sequence of saved prompts and templates. Reviews output at a fixed point before moving on. Can repeat the same process on the next matter with similar results.
E3 · Distinguished
Designs workflows with clear handoffs between AI steps and human review. Uses different tools for different stages, such as an approved document review tool for extraction and a separate step for drafting. Documents the workflow so a colleague can run it and an auditor can follow it.
E4 · Exceptional
Builds the team’s review system and measures it: where errors enter, which steps save time, and which need more oversight. Removes steps that no longer add value. Other teams adopt these workflows because they hold up under review.
Common mistakes
One prompt for the whole data room
Asking a model to review hundreds of documents and report all risks at once gives it too many jobs. Items get missed, and you cannot tell which.
No record of what was reviewed
A legal workflow needs to show which documents were checked, by whom, and against what standard. Build that record into the process.
Escalation left to the model
A workflow where the model decides what reaches a lawyer will eventually let an important issue through. Set escalation rules that a person applies or confirms.
A worked example
Reviewing about forty customer contracts for change of control clauses before a proposed acquisition.
Upload all the contracts into one chat and ask which ones have change of control problems.
The model may skip documents, miss clauses in schedules, or judge "problems" against an unstated standard. Nobody can tell which contracts were reviewed in full.
Step 1: in an approved tool, a saved prompt runs on each contract separately. It extracts any change of control, assignment, or termination-on-transfer clause, with clause number and quoted text. Step 2: a reviewer checks each extraction against the contract. Step 3: findings go into a fixed table with contract name, clause, consent required, and notice period. Step 4: a lawyer reviews the flagged contracts and decides on next steps.
Each contract gets the same treatment, each extraction is checked, and the judgment calls sit with a lawyer. The table shows what was reviewed, and a colleague could repeat the process.
The full study guide for this skill, for every role, is Putting it together. The other five skills for legal and compliance professionals are on the AI skills for legal and compliance professionals page. A one-page summary is in the AI workflow checklist.
See where you stand
The free check grades putting it together and the other five skills in about fifteen minutes. Nobody sees the grade but you.
Then build the skills and prove it. The three steps for legal and compliance professionals list the courses and templates that fit the work.