November 2010: the ten most interesting posts according to the one who wrote them

Abolish engagement letters (aka retention letters) from law departments (Nov. 1, 2010).
Abolish the template letter with its standard recitation of expectations and obligations, all of which should be covered by outside counsel guidelines.

Kudos for full allocation at JPMorgan Chase of legal expenses to business units that incurred them (Nov. 1, 2010).
Allocation introduces some market-like discipline to legal spending.

A broadside at the soft-underbelly of what only licensed US lawyers are entitled to do (Nov. 2, 2010).
Huge swathes of what associates currently do could shift to non-attorneys if you reason the way the author does.

Contract simplification cannot proceed without client agreement on basic business positions (Nov. 17, 2010).
Lawyers on their own can only go so far to streamline contractual language.

Core competencies have to do with crucial contributions by lawyers, not their personal attributes (Nov. 19, 2010).
A core competency of a law department has to do with its outputs, what it delivers not how it produces it.

Contrary to hype, total legal spending 2008-9 likely rose as a percentage of revenue (Nov. 23, 2010).
Since corporate revenue dropped significantly but total legal spending only dropped a bit, then spending as a percentage of revenue climbed.

More than one-quarter of your working day on e-mail, and some thoughts about that (Nov. 27, 2010).
Perhaps the single biggest boost to productivity would be steps to improve the flow and handling of e-mail.

Survey data on how in-house lawyers found their current position (Nov. 28, 2010).
Recruitment consultancies, personal contacts, approaches by current employers, and online job-boards are all quantified.

CARL – Compliance, Audit, Risk Management and Law: the four-legged stool of risks and reputation (Nov. 28, 2010).
Sometimes referred to as the risk professions, this quartet has overlapping but distinctive roles.

Netherlands ranks best, USA in the middle, and Singapore lowest on novel index of four key benchmarks (Nov. 30, 2010).
Total rankings on four important measures in the General Counsel Metrics benchmark survey gave a cumulative country score.