An article in the Acad. Mgt. J., April 2012 at 399, concerns a problem well recognized among human resources professionals: “the transition from expatriation to repatriation routinely culminates with repatriates quitting organizations.” If you post a lawyer to an overseas location, when they return they often leave the company. The…
On a pace to exceed 1,000 legal departments, the first release this year of GC Metrics survey of 2011 staffing and spending goes this week to the 332 departments that have submitted their data. The lengthy report focuses on 25 fundamental management metrics, such as lawyers per billion of revenue,…
When meteorologists predict the weather for a month, they often use one of the so-called naïve forecasts. What the average spend during June for the last five years – the counterpart of the climate of the region and the basis for the naïve forecast – stands as a first-cut forecast.…
Dr. Silvia Hodges combines teaching at Fordham Law School with her work at CT TyMetrix. As an academic, she has researched and spoken about procurement practices related to law departments. In a recent e-mail to me she explained her efforts to bring together procurement professionals who want to understand better…
The In-House Community comprises over 18,000 in-house lawyers and those with a responsibility for legal and compliance issues within organizations along the “New Silk Road.” The New Silk Road is their clever term for a broad swath of the world from Asia through the Middle East. The activities of the…
Roughly summarized from the research presented in MMS Insights, four MMS packages stand out as having averaged more years in use, more lawyers in their departments, and more external spend under management. A second group of four packages were, generally speaking, less in longevity, less in average numbers of lawyers,…
The supplement to the ACC Docket, May 2012 at 8, charts the career of Brigitte Catellier, Vice President, Legal Affairs and Secretary of Astral Media Inc. Early in her career, while at a large Canadian firm, she was asked by one of her clients, Culinar, to take on the tasks…
An excellent article in the ACC Docket, May 2012 at 32, describes the Litigation Investment Model of Reckitt Benckiser. Essentially, the model puts law firms at risk for their profit margin when they represent that company. And, those profits are lucrative. For the 200 largest law firms in the United…
As my General Counsel Metrics benchmark survey now collects compensation data, I pay more attention to findings from that realm. For example, “In Brazil, lawyers can expect to receive an average basic salary of $279,600 – 21 percent higher than the average of $231,500 in the United States.” That comes…
In-house counsel app. Thomson Reuters has released what it believes is the first iPad app delivering corporate counsel specific information. Called GC Advisor, the app offers information, technology and legal research tips, as well as articles and CLE classes. There is also an RSS feed to CLE-accredited webcasts from the…