Include a user guide to key points that a client (or general counsel) needs to review

One way to increase the productivity of a law department is to focus reviewers of documents on the document’s key points. The idea for this recommendation came from an article by Petra Pasternak in the Recorder, as reproduced on Law.com.

As she says, “Avoid sending an e-mail with a huge attachment and asking a GC to ‘review it.’” Far better to prepare a user’s guide that tells the person – whom might be a client executive – the strategic decisions and important risks surfaced by the document.

Outside counsel who draft long documents should ask their in-house counterpart whether a guide for the perplexed (and busy) would help them and be worth the costs.