That hurts, that view really hurts. That business managers resent laws and kick the dog of the department that reminds them about its costs and constraints can’t be denied. That it takes time for a lawyer to look at an agreement or an advertisement or a potential patent or a…
According to an ACC Docket article (June 2011 at 78), partners in some law firms are gatekeepers “acting as channels through which communications and legal advice must be directed.” Such an arrangement, by my lights, obstructs, slows, and costs. It obstructs because if someone in a law department has a…
During a recent consulting project, the general counsel said that about two years ago he had systematically met with nearly two dozen of his department’s major clients. He had asked all them basically the same questions – “How are we doing?” and “How can we do better?” – and compiled…
How to get bulky board books to members of the board of directors has always been a problem, if only for the simple minded logistics of photocopying, collating, binding, and shipping the complicated tomes. Some corporate secretarial functions have turned to online software platforms to expedite delivery (and to benefit…
In-house attorneys may fume when told they cannot hire any longer the trusted, familiar counsel they used to, that they must transition work to the large and unfamiliar winners of a preferred counsel contest. Ruptured are the long-standing relationships, gone are the modest bills from dedicated partners cast-away are the…
In the Fall of 2010 ALM Legal Intelligence collected surveys from 176 US in-house lawyers. LexisNexis CounselLink published the findings. A part of the report draws on a theoretical distinction of the Association of Corporate Counsel between what it has defined as “traditional” and “proactive” law departments. The archetypal operating…
Law departments have to provide to their company’s outside auditors sufficient information for them to prepare their reports on contingent liabilities. The law department administrator from The Williams Companies, speaking at Mitratech’s Interact 2011 Conference, said that the department had developed a tool to help with the “complex and not…
Marc Firestone, the general counsel of Kraft Foods, told an audience at the SuperConference about his law department’s steps to define what his lawyers mean when they use non-quantified terms. Non-quantified terms – called “estimative language” by the National Security Agency – include “strong probability,” “poor chance,” “pretty good odds,”…
At the SuperConference yesterday, Carrie Hightman, the general counsel of NiSource, offered her thoughts on a panel about relations with the CEO, CFO and the Board of Directors. She stressed how important it is to have a “good working relationship” with each of them and offered four particular recommendations. Be…
I read about a company’s use of “life-like chatbots” that are “emotionally intelligent and engaging.” According to an ad from eGain Communications in KMWorld, May 2011 at Profiles 7, “The bot chats with customers, providing answers and processing data, and escalates to live agents when needed.” A law department might…