She will head up the organisation’s legal innovation centre
The College of Law has appointed Alison Laird as its new director of innovation.
Laird will lead the organisation’s Centre for Legal Innovation and spearhead its AI strategy. She brings “decades of experience in public and professional services” to the role, having worked with multifunctional teams and international businesses focusing on innovation, College of Law Group CEO Marcus Martin said.
“Alison Laird’s leadership of the College of Law AI strategy is an essential role as AI continues to permeate every area of what we do,” Martin said. “Alison will be responsible for AI strategy across teaching, content creation, and internal operations with a focus on governance, capability uplift, and long-term value.”
Laird has served on the Centre for Legal Innovation’s advisory board for the past six years. She is consulting director at Elevate, working with legal departments and law firms on legal operations, people, process, technology and AI.
Under her dual roles, industry insights can be channeled directly into the centre’s strategy, AI governance framework, and practitioner-facing innovation programs, College of Law said. This helps ensure that courses remain relevant and responsive to emerging challenges.
The Centre for Legal Innovation operates as an independent think tank with established boundaries to maintain its academic, research, and public-interest mandate as a neutral resource for the legal profession.
Laird is expected to establish a comprehensive AI strategy aligned to education, research, and professional impact across the college.
“My objective is to utilise AI to enhance learning experiences, personalisation, and accessibility. We will embrace practical experimentation to inform guidance to the profession, not just theory,” she said.
