Legal Tech Selection Guide for Lawyers
Summary
Jay McAllister of Paragon Tech presented at ABA TECHSHOW on evaluating legal technology and AI with a skeptical, results-driven approach. The session addresses vendor due diligence tied to lawyers' duty of competence, urging firms to understand the benefits and risks of new technology and to ask what large language model powers a tool and what primary legal data sources it uses to reduce hallucinations. McAllister describes Paragon's 'Leverage AI' framework, which begins with identifying a firm's limiting operational constraint, and shares a case study where a custom GPT cut discovery chronology work from over an hour to five minutes with human verification.
“He ties vendor due diligence to lawyers' duty of competence, urging firms to understand the benefits and risks of new tech and to ask what large language model powers a tool and, more importantly, what primary legal data sources it uses to reduce hallucinations.”
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The source is a podcast/interview transcript from ABA TECHSHOW featuring Jay McAllister of Paragon Tech discussing how law firms should evaluate legal technology and AI tools. McAllister emphasizes that marketing hype often overstates capabilities, particularly around software integrations, and stresses the importance of checking whether syncing is unidirectional or bidirectional. The session connects vendor due diligence to lawyers' ethical duty of competence and introduces Paragon's 'Leverage AI' framework as a structured approach to technology evaluation.
Legal professionals and law firms evaluating AI tools should treat this content as guidance on adopting a systematic, skeptical approach to vendor evaluation. Firms implementing new legal technology should understand both the benefits and risks, ask specific questions about the underlying language model and data sources, and implement verification procedures similar to the human review step described in the discovery chronology case study.
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Apr 27, 2026GovPing captured this document from the original source. If the source has since changed or been removed, this is the text as it existed at that time.
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Live at the ABA TECHSHOW, host Terrell interviews Jay McAllister of Paragon Tech about how law firms should evaluate legal technology, especially AI, with a skeptical, results-driven approach. Jay explains that marketing hype often overstates capabilities, using software “integrations” as an example, where firms must check whether syncing is unidirectional or bidirectional. He ties vendor due diligence to lawyers’ duty of competence, urging firms to understand the benefits and risks of new tech and to ask what large language model powers a tool and, more importantly, what primary legal data sources it uses to reduce hallucinations. Jay describes Paragon’s “Leverage AI” framework, starting with identifying a firm’s limiting operational constraint, and shares a case where a custom GPT cut discovery chronology work from over an hour to five minutes with human verification.
Speakers
Terrell A Turner
Terrell A Turner, CPA is the founder of the NY Times recognized accounting firm www.TLTurnerGroup.com. He is a 3x top CPA in America, and a 2x Top 20 Global Finance Influencer. His accounting firm focuses on making...
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Jay McAllister
As someone who has always had an unconventional interest in studying technology and business, approaching both with the healthy skepticism of someone who demands real results, Jay found his tribe within the legal profession....
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