Why process matters: trusted expertise, clear results
Legal know-how is the DNA of sound legal decision-making. It combines practical understanding of legal principles with contextual insight into how they apply in real-world scenarios. It’s not just about knowing what the law says; it’s about knowing what it means for you and your client right now, in a particular jurisdiction, under specific circumstances.
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Process and people deliver practical value
Editing and quality assurance
No lawyer can be an expert in every practice area and every jurisdiction. That’s why 92% of US attorneys use a know-how tool like Practical Law to navigate unfamiliar areas of the law efficiently.
But legal know-how is only useful if it’s accurate and up to date. Rigorous research, thorough editing, and meticulous maintenance of resources are critically important in a know-how tool.
Let’s take a look at how these apply to the editorial process for Practical Law.
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Read blog ↗Topic selection
Every resource begins with a deliberate and informed approach to topic selection. Attorney-editors review a variety of inputs, including customer requests, advisory board feedback, legal updates, newly published resources, and key news developments to identify high-value topics that reflect the evolving needs of legal professionals. This ensures each piece of content is relevant, timely, and responsive to the questions practitioners are asking.
Drafting
Editors invest significant time reviewing and analyzing both primary and secondary sources, drawing on their own experience and research expertise.
The goal of the first draft is to deliver clear, comprehensive guidance that addresses all major practical considerations and anticipates related questions. Drafts are structured in the distinct, user-friendly Practical Law tone and format to ensure consistency across all resources.
Peer review and revision
Editors who specialize in the same and adjacent practice areas offer detailed, substantive feedback to ensure accuracy, clarity, and practical value. The lead editor incorporates this input, refining language, adding relevant cross-links, and developing a stronger, more complete second draft.
After peer review, the resource moves to sub-editing. A dedicated team of attorney-editors proofreads every detail, ensuring consistency with Practical Law’s high editorial standards, polishing prose for clarity and tone, and verifying all internal links for accuracy and usefulness.
Maintenance
Once a resource is published, it’s not static. What sets Practical Law apart is not just the expertise behind every resource, but the level of ongoing attention resources receive. Content is continually monitored for legal developments, with updates integrated to reflect the latest changes in law and practice.
When you open a resource in Practical Law, you’ll find a statement in the margin that tells you if it’s a maintained resource. You can view a complete history of changes by selecting View Resource History, offering transparency into how the content has evolved over time. If you want real-time updates, setting up a Document Alert ensures automatic notifications whenever changes are made.
Trusting the professionals
To have expert, trusted resources, you need expert, trusted professionals creating them. With Practical Law, you’re backed by a team of 740 attorney-editors with experience in top-tier law firms, corporate legal departments, and government agencies worldwide. Our editors are dedicated full-time professionals, ensuring their sole focus is on developing thoroughly vetted resources. This commitment allows them to provide high-quality content without the distractions of other professional obligations.
Our professionals leverage their frontline experience with dynamic legal challenges to incorporate insights into every resource they develop. When the law shifts, our experts stay ahead, offering you practical, actionable guidance tailored to real-world conditions. Last year, US editors spent 134,000+ hours maintaining over 18,000+ resources. This intensive, hands-on approach to content creation and maintenance is a key reason Practical Law is consistently recognized for its clarity, usability, and authority.
Utilizing state-of-the-art AI
Practical Law combines the expertise of leading attorney-editors with cutting-edge legal AI technology. Features like Search & Summarize Practical Law use AI to tap into the full resource collection to answer your natural language questions.
Search and Summarize Practical Law delivers clear, concise answers by analyzing the most relevant Practical Law resources, so you can move from inquiry to actionable work product more efficiently. Because it draws exclusively from Practical Law’s trusted content, the information is both reliable and easy to validate through linked source materials.
Powered by CoCounsel Legal, the tool synthesizes legal guidance into readable summaries with embedded footnotes for deeper exploration. You can access it directly from the Practical Law homepage or the Dynamic Tool Set menu by submitting detailed questions in plain English.
Search & Summarize Practical Law retains context and search history, enabling you to seamlessly build on past queries, refine understanding, and ensure consistency throughout your research. It streamlines the process by eliminating the manual effort of sorting and summarizing search results.
Process and people deliver practical value
In a world where legal complexity continues to grow, Practical Law offers clarity, confidence, and a competitive edge. Its rigorous editorial process, anchored by a team of seasoned legal professionals and enhanced by cutting-edge AI technology, ensures that every resource delivers what matters most: trusted guidance tailored to the realities of modern practice.
From careful topic selection to continuous maintenance and intelligent summarization, every step is designed to save time, reduce risk, and elevate the quality of legal work. For professionals who demand precision, Practical Law is more than a tool — it’s a partner in delivering better outcomes, faster.
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