How Charles Russell Speechlys is building responsible AI capability for the future of legal services

How the international law firm partnered with QA to build confidence in Microsoft Copilot and develop capability for responsible AI adoption.

Overview

As generative AI adoption accelerates across legal services, firms face a critical challenge: how to realise the benefits of AI while maintaining the professional judgement, governance, and responsibility that clients expect.

Charles Russell Speechlys recognised that responsible AI adoption requires more than deploying new technology. While Microsoft 365 Copilot offers significant opportunities to improve productivity, collaboration, and knowledge sharing, the firm understood the importance of ensuring AI is used safely, ethically, and in line with the professional obligations of legal services.

To support this journey, Charles Russell Speechlys partnered with QA to deliver a practical Microsoft Copilot learning experience, helping employees build the skills, confidence, and judgement needed to use AI effectively and responsibly.

The challenge

While AI offers significant opportunities to improve productivity, accelerate research, and free up time for higher-value activities, legal professionals must balance these benefits against critical considerations around confidentiality, regulatory compliance, governance, and professional judgement.

Realising these benefits requires more than learning how to use new tools. Employees need to understand where AI can add value, where risks must be managed, and where human expertise remains essential.

Charles Russell Speechlys wanted employees to understand not only how to use Microsoft Copilot, but how to apply it confidently and responsibly within the context of their professional and client responsibilities.

The firm sought to:

• Increase AI literacy and confidence in Microsoft 365 Copilot.
• Explore practical, day-to-day productivity use cases.
• Understand readiness for wider AI adoption across legal functions.
• Assess the value of role-specific learning in accelerating AI adoption.

Underpinning these objectives was a recognition that successful AI adoption is as much a people challenge as a technology challenge. Developing capability, confidence, and trust would be critical to realising sustainable value from AI investments.

The solution

To support the firm's AI ambitions, Charles Russell Speechlys partnered with QA to deliver an immersive Microsoft Copilot learning experience powered by TeamQuest, QA's gamified learning platform.

Bringing together professionals from research, legal project management, innovation, and knowledge management, the programme provided hands-on experience using Microsoft Copilot in realistic workplace scenarios. Participants explored prompting techniques, practical use cases, and team-based challenges designed to encourage experimentation and problem solving.

The experience also created space for discussion around responsible AI adoption, governance, risk management, and the future role of AI in legal services. Participants explored how AI can act as a thought partner, while ensuring human expertise remains central. The interactive format encouraged curiosity, experimentation, discussion, and knowledge sharing, helping participants explore both the opportunities and responsibilities that come with AI adoption in a legal environment.

The impact

The programme received exceptionally positive feedback from participants and demonstrated the effectiveness of immersive, contextualised AI learning.

Beyond the positive feedback, it generated valuable insight into varying levels of AI maturity, confidence, and readiness across attendees. This reinforced a lesson emerging across professional services: generic AI training can only take organisations so far. To drive meaningful adoption, learning must be tailored to specific roles, workflows, client requirements, and the reality of day-to-day work.

The experience also helped participants reimagine how AI can support productivity, knowledge work, and ideation. It highlighted opportunities to reduce time spent on routine tasks and focus more on higher-value activities, while ensuring AI complements, rather than replaces, human expertise.

As a result, Charles Russell Speechlys gained valuable insight into how future AI capability development could support different functions and levels of maturity across the business, helping to inform the firm's approach to responsible AI adoption.

Key outcomes included:

• 87% learner satisfaction
• Increased confidence in Microsoft Copilot across participating teams
• Greater understanding of responsible AI principles and governance considerations
• Improved understanding of where AI can support professional work and where human judgement remains essential
• Valuable insight into differing levels of AI maturity and confidence across the organisation

Client perspective

“When we evaluated the training across the participants, it scored an exceptional 87% feedback rating. I received a lot of positive feedback, and the gamification element was very well received.

The programme highlighted that future AI training must be role-specific and contextualised. The thought partnership aspects are particularly relevant for legal professionals, and that's where we see significant opportunity moving forward.”

Laura Leven, Charles Russell Speechlys

Conclusion

Charles Russell Speechlys' Microsoft Copilot journey demonstrates that effective AI adoption starts with people.

By investing in practical, contextualised learning, the firm has strengthened confidence, sparked curiosity, and built capability while maintaining a strong focus on responsible AI use. The programme also provided valuable insight into differing levels of AI maturity, helping inform future capability development across the organisation.

As AI continues to reshape legal services, Charles Russell Speechlys is helping to establish an important principle for the industry: sustainable AI adoption depends not simply on access to technology, but on equipping people with the knowledge, judgement, and confidence to use it effectively and responsibly.

Accelerating AI capability in legal services

Charles Russell Speechlys' experience reflects a broader trend across the legal sector. Successful AI adoption requires more than technology deployment. It requires the people capability, governance, and practical experience needed to create measurable business value.

QA's Legal AI Skills Accelerator helps legal organisations move from awareness to action through structured learning focused on:

• AI literacy and prompting fundamentals
• Business value creation within legal services
• Risk, governance, and responsible AI
• Practical use-case identification and adoption planning

Explore the Legal AI Skills Accelerator and turn AI investment into impact.