As artificial intelligence accelerates into the mainstream, the legal profession finds itself at a pivotal moment—challenged not only to interpret the implications of emerging technologies, but to lead with clarity, accountability, and care.
In July 2024, the Menzies Leadership Foundation, in collaboration with the Centre for AI and Digital Ethics (CAIDE), hosted a landmark event at Melbourne Law School: Demystifying Generative AI. This timely conversation, moderated by Professor Jeannie Marie Paterson and featuring Lee Hickin (AI Technology & Policy Lead, Asia, Microsoft) and Anna Jaffe (Policy, Regulatory Affairs and Responsible Tech, Atlassian), sought to unpack the generative AI stack and explore what ethical, effective leadership looks like in the face of rapid technological change.
The panel pulled back the curtain on the architecture of generative AI—from the physical infrastructure and data systems that power foundational models to the layered governance, safety mechanisms, and ethical dilemmas that these technologies now demand. The discussion made clear that the term “AI” is often misunderstood, used interchangeably across a spectrum of technologies. Generative AI, the focus of the session, represents a distinct class—capable of producing novel outputs such as text, images, code, and video based on probabilistic patterns derived from vast datasets.
But the conversation extended well beyond technical explanation. At its heart was a provocation: How do we design and regulate technologies that are reshaping our public and legal institutions in real time?
Lee Hickin brought insight into the role of safety mitigations, such as red teaming and retrieval-augmented generation (RAG), while noting that no system is immune from bias, hallucination, or misuse.
Anna Jaffe pushed the conversation toward the regulatory frontier, emphasising the need for legal frameworks that reflect not only what these systems can do, but what they should do in a just and democratic society.
For the Menzies Leadership Foundation, this dialogue exemplified our belief that leadership is not merely about keeping up with technological change—it’s about shaping it with principle, systems thinking, and responsibility. It’s about recognising that law and policy are not neutral instruments but active terrains of power that must be stewarded with ethical foresight.
The event also underscored the urgency of interdisciplinary leadership development.
Lawyers, engineers, ethicists, designers, and regulators must now collaborate across silos to develop shared language and mutual understanding. It is precisely this kind of convergence the Ninian Stephen Law Program: New Legal Thinking for Emerging Technologies was created to support. Systems thinking, embedded in the program’s approach, enables legal professionals to examine not just tools, but their place within wider social and institutional systems.
What emerged from Demystifying Generative AI was not just greater understanding, but a call to action—for legal professionals to lead not by default, but by design. In an era of algorithmic influence and technological opacity, we need legal thinkers who can navigate complexity, anticipate risk, and uphold the values of justice and inclusion.
This is the leadership the Menzies Leadership Foundation is committed to nurturing.
The Menzies Leadership Foundation aspires to amplify a leadership movement which encourages citizens to clarify their purpose, deepen the collective understanding of our responsibility to each other and motivates all to act for the ‘greater good’.
Our work emphasises the imperative of building a non-siloed coalition of the willing to explore and build a new leadership paradigm which engenders confidence in our leaders, builds collaborative capacity and best positions each of us to step forward with the attributes and ability to navigate the complexities of an increasingly challenging and polarised world.
We invite you to join us in this quest.
The Menzies Leadership Foundation aspires to amplify a leadership movement which encourages citizens to clarify their purpose, deepen the collective understanding of our responsibility to each other and motivates all to act for the ‘greater good’.
Our work emphasises the imperative of building a non-siloed coalition of the willing to explore and build a new leadership paradigm which engenders confidence in our leaders, builds collaborative capacity and best positions each of us to step forward with the attributes and ability to navigate the complexities of an increasingly challenging and polarised world.
We invite you to join us in this quest.
