As an alternative to secondment from a law firm, consider providers of in-house counsel on an as-needed basis

Three Canadian firms that provide lawyers to law departments for project work when needed are noted in the Canadian Corporate Counsel Association’s magazine (Autumn 2010) at 36. They are Cognition LLP, Delegatus Legal Services, and LexLocom. Cognition, the article notes, is five years old and has 24 lawyers. Delegatus, also five years old, has 15 lawyers.

It makes sense for general counsel to plug in a qualified lawyer for short or long stints if they can thereby put off a permanent hire and yet reduce outside counsel fees (See my post of Dec. 9, 2008: refers to GCA Law Partners (Mountain View, CA), FSB Corporate Counsel (Atlanta), Axiom (NY), Phillips & Reiter (Houston), and Paragon Legal (San Francisco); April 20, 2009: Yahoo’s shift from law firms to temp lawyers; and July 12, 2011: Paragon Legal with 60 lawyers available.).