From legal practice into legal technology

I started out on a fairly traditional legal path. I studied law, trained at a Magic Circle firm, qualified into regulatory work, and for a while I was doing the thing I thought I was supposed to do. But after a few years in practice, I found myself wanting something different. I was still interested in law, but I was more excited by technology, by building things, and by the idea that legal work could be made better rather than simply repeated in the same way.

That was what first pulled me into legal tech. I moved into my firm’s internal legal tech startup, working with designers and developers to shape a product from a lawyer’s perspective. It was my first real experience of being close to product, close to customers, and close to the process of turning an idea into something people could actually use.

Why Wordsmith felt like the right move

I joined Wordsmith because the product felt genuinely strong, and because the company’s focus made sense to me. In-house legal teams are often under-resourced, stretched, and looking for ways to increase their capacity without lowering the quality of their work. Wordsmith is building for that reality, and I think that clarity matters.

A few months in, that instinct has only been reinforced. The product is landing with people because it is solving real problems, and you can feel that in the conversations we have with customers: they are engaged, excited, and genuinely looking for ways to bring this into their day-to-day work. That gives the work a lot of energy, because you are not building in theory; you are building with a very clear sense that people want this and need it.

There was also something about the team. The product vision felt sharp, the thinking around customers felt considered, and it was clear that people here cared about building something properly. That was a real green flag for me, and having been here, I would say that has been true as well. People are thoughtful, very capable, and serious about the standard of work, but there is also a real sense of momentum around the company that makes it exciting to be part of.

Making legal work feel more tangible

As a legal engineer, my work sits between legal understanding, customer problems, and product thinking. For me, the exciting part is getting to meet people from a wide range of companies and sectors, understand the problems they are facing, and work with them to come up with better ways of doing things.

That is one of the biggest differences from legal practice. As a lawyer, especially in advisory work, you can give the client advice and then it sort of vanishes. You do not always know what happens after that. Here, the impact is much more tangible. You can see people adopting the tools and workflows you helped create, and that is very gratifying.

Shaping what legal engineering becomes

Legal engineering is still a new role, and that is part of what makes it interesting. It is not a pure engineering role, and most legal engineers do not come from software backgrounds. The legal background matters because our customers are lawyers. It’s important to understand their language, their expectations, their risk mindset, and the way they actually work.

The role is still being shaped, and that is a big part of the appeal. You get to bring a builder mindset to legal problems, but you are also helping define what this kind of work becomes. That is not something you get very often.

At Wordsmith, I am doing work I genuinely enjoy, with people who care about doing it properly, and with a product that can have a real impact on the day-to-day lives of legal teams.

"When I looked at where legal work was heading, I wanted to be one of the people building that future, not one of the people it just happened to.”