Talk about how artificial intelligence will someday take lawyers’ jobs has long been dismissed as much ado about nothing — until now.
Microsoft has been conducting layoffs across the company across the globe since mid-May, and while in-house attorneys are typically safe from such employment woes, the rise of AI may be to blame when it comes to the companies latest cuts. Microsoft President Brad Smith has given mixed messages about whether artificial intelligence was behind the company’s decision to conduct layoffs, first saying that AI was “not a predominant factor” in the move, and later saying that “[s]uccess in life … is always about prioritization, and it’s always about investing in the future.”
To date, the tech company has laid off dozens of lawyers. Corporate Counsel has the details on the scope of the layoffs for legal:
Microsoft has laid off 15,000 employees across the globe since mid-May. Just in the tech giant’s home state of Washington, the reductions have cost at least 32 company attorneys and five paralegals their jobs, according to state filings obtained by Law.com.
A layoff notice filed with the state’s Employment Security Department shows that at least 22 attorneys and five paralegals were among 305 Redmond, Washington, employees laid off after Microsoft announced 6,000 job cuts on May 13. The second round of layoffs, announced July 2, displaced 9,000 more workers, 830 of them in Redmond, Seattle or Bellevue. At least 10 of the 830 were lawyers, a layoff notice shows.
As further noted by Corporate Counsel, based on the ratio of legal layoffs to total layoffs at Microsoft’s headquarters (3.1%), the company could potentially be looking at worldwide legal layoffs in the hundreds, about 465 legal jobs, to be exact. Sean Burke, founding partner of recruiting firm Whistler Partners, who places tech attorneys at startups, said that while “[t]here’s no AI that completely replaces the lawyer,” he thinks the lawyers who lost their jobs may be on the younger side. “My guess is that the lion’s share of laid-off attorneys at Microsoft are in the bottom tranche, lawyers three to seven years out of law school that are more easily replaced, where you can get less lawyers to do more using AI,” he said.
Best of luck to all of the in-house counsel at Microsoft who may have lost their jobs thanks to AI disruption.
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Microsoft Layoffs Hit Legal Department as AI Reshapes Staffing Strategy [Corporate Counsel]
Staci Zaretsky is a senior editor at Above the Law, where she’s worked since 2011. She’d love to hear from you, so please feel free to email her with any tips, questions, comments, or critiques. You can follow her on Bluesky, X/Twitter, and Threads, or connect with her on LinkedIn.