Law Department Management Blog
Refuse to pay for very late time entries. One aggressive law department has in its outside counsel guidelines a provision to encourage its firms to submit timely bills. The department will not pay for any time that is submitted more than 60 days before the date of the invoice. The department must have e-billing capabilities to detect these infractions, but at least it pushes law firms to behave responsibly (See my post of Oct. 2005, 2005 about guidelines to help law departments pay bills quickly.).
Job fairs to attract minority candidates for law departments. During a recent webinar on talent management in law departments, Amy Gallent, SVP, Associate General Counsel and Chief of Staff at Hartford Financial Services Inc., spoke to the topic of encouraging diversity. She explained that several companies in the Hartford, Connecticut area have combined to put on a job fair. The job fair targets minority applicants from local law schools. The law departments work collectively to address the particular questions of minority candidates.
Another network of law firms – Markson MacDonald. According to Met. Corp. Counsel, Vol. 15, Nov. 2007 at 43, Markson MacDonald – The Barristers Group “is a network of over 30 Canadian and international lawyers who engage in cross referrals (See my post of June 20, 2007 with several references to other associations of firms.).