It is a challenge having compliance staff, or any non-lawyer function such as contracts management or internal audit, reporting to the general counsel, because those staff may be viewed by the lawyers as second-class citizens. If deep down the lawyers in charge believe that lawyers stand at the top of…
The March 2005 issue of Counsel to Counsel referred to an interesting idea (pg. 9): for a large merger, the general counsel selected a senior lawyer, suspended or re-assigned that lawyer’s typical responsibilities, and for the duration of the deal, made the merger the lawyer’s sole job. (Also noteworthy, the…
Law departments based in expensive areas, such as the major coastal cities and Chicago, often think that their compensation must be higher than that of competitor’s law departments in the hinterlands. The more modest cost of living, they assume, allows the remote departments to pay less. The trouble is, compensation…
I used to recommend that legal departments prune their collections of titles Rather than proliferate titles, I said, stick to the basic trio structure, Corporate Level Legal Level – Specialty. For instance, VP Associate General Counsel – Litigation. Since many in-house lawyers are not officers, they would have a two-part…
Let me be provocative. Given equal intelligence and work ethic between someone admitted to the bar after law school and a paralegal, both working the same time in a law department, what is the practical difference between them? Both will have to learn the vast majority of law and practice…
Having recently spent several days with a law department whose lawyers work in open cubicles, I confess to some amazement. From my first day at Weil Gotshal, all through my selling days and the past 16 years of consulting I have had my own office. Not only is there much…