How Legal Departments Should Pilot New Legal Tech Before Signing a Long-Term Contract

Legal departments are investing more in technology than ever before.

According to the Thomson Reuters 2024 Legal Department Operations Index, over 60 percent of in-house teams reported increasing their legal technology budgets in the past two years. The pressure to modernise is real. But so is the failure rate.

Research consistently shows that a significant proportion of enterprise software implementations fall short of their intended goals — not because the technology is wrong, but because it was never properly tested in real conditions. For legal teams, the stakes are particularly high: bad tool choices affect matter quality, compliance posture, and attorney time.

The most reliable way to reduce this risk is not a better vendor demo. It is a structured, deliberate pilot program conducted before any long-term commitment is made.

The Problem with Demo-Driven Buying

Most legal tech purchasing decisions begin with vendor-controlled demos: polished, pre-loaded with ideal data, and optimised to highlight features rather than expose limitations. Legal teams then evaluate based on feature lists, peer recommendations, or internal pressure to show modernisation progress.