Having recently worked on a project where the company’s procurement staff became involved, it has struck me that more and more of the procurement mindset will force itself on law departments as they retain outside counsel. Procurement likes process, low cost, electronic retentions (by which I mean auctions), evaluations, consolidation — all ideas that may be anathema to some law departments. Procurement thinks large-scale and they think small scale, unit costs for example, and these are views that law departments, with their bespoke hiring practices, never consider. The tectonic clash will continue between purchasing agents and lawyers.
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