A&O Shearman offers tips for using AI in TC applications

Contrasts with approach of Big Four accountancy firms and The Bar Council, which ban use of ChatGPT

Trans-Atlantic Magic Circle mega-firm A&O Shearman is offering advice to law students on how to use AI in their applications to the firm.

The outfit, which the Legal Cheek Firms Most List 2025 shows takes on 80 trainees each year, has brought out the guidance to encourage students to use the tech to supplement, and not replace, their own work.

AI “shouldn’t be a substitute for your voice and capabilities” the firm say, although using it can be a “highly effective resource” if used in “the most responsible way possible”.

Students could consider using the tech to help format, design, and tailor CVs, check for errors, and “help you articulate clearly and concisely”. Using AI for generating potential questions and providing feedback on responses can also help with interview preparation and technique, the firm adds.

The advice warns students, however, not to use AI to exaggerate or misrepresent their skills and experiences, and not to copy AI responses word for word. In short, the advice says, “honesty and integrity are the foundations of a career in law”.

The firm also encourages students who use AI to “be ready to discuss this” with the firm. “We’re interested in the questions you asked AI and how you refined the responses from it” the advice reads.

This follows a similar move earlier this year by Shoosmiths, which encourages students to use new tech to “refine and develop your own original thoughts, not replace them”. Like A&O Shearman, Shoosmiths also emphasises that “integrity and honesty are fundamental attributes that cannot be replaced by technology.”

But this approach is in stark contrast to that being increasingly adopted in other sectors, including at the Big Four accountancy firms. KPMG and Deloitte, for example, require applicants to confirm that their applications are AI-free.

The other side of the legal profession, the bar, has also not warmed to the use of AI in applications just yet. Applicants applying for a pupillage via the Bar Council-run Pupillage Gateway are required to confirm that their applications are their “sole creation and original work”.

Students, the Bar Council adds, must also agree that “any application which has been written with the use of any generative AI LLMs like ChatGPT or any similar programme will be excluded from the shortlisting process”.