The Covid-19 lockdown has completely changed how the legal world works. And as a news service that scours the wires for news of hiring and promotion, anecdotally we can say that for now, that kind of news is drying up. What is up are discussions on social media, especially, for housebound in-house attorneys, on the […]
It’s not exactly news to most general counsel that they’re not just doing what lawyers do. In the best of times, they’re crisis managers, business advisers, IT professionals, and HR advisers. But nothing brings that to the fore like a genuine crisis. And the Covid-19 pandemic certainly qualifies. Olga Mack of the contract management vendor […]
We’re taking some time off from COVID-19 coverage today to look at Latin America and the legal trends there. The global law firm Jones Day sent out a client note, and it concluded, “although many of the challenges described in this Commentary are shared by other regions of the world, institutional weaknesses and political uncertainty […]
As a public service, we continue to chart the changes that Brexit, which finally arrived on Jan. 31, brings to the table. We’re now in the period during which the UK and EU will negotiate the final rules governing their future. Bottom line? During this transition, the UK and EU will continue to recognize IP […]
Even the most competent people make mistakes at work. Sometimes it is a small error and fixing it is possible; others have (almost) unpredictable, bad consequences. And in the latter cases, when working as a team, division and distances are created that are destined to inexorably change relations between colleagues, and especially with customers. What […]
We like to visit Microsoft President Brad Smith’s blog every so often. Smith is also the company’s chief legal officer, and the blog gives a look into the software giant’s policy. A recent post by Julie Brill – Corporate Vice President for Global Privacy and Regulatory Affairs and Chief Privacy Officer describes the state of Washington’s […]
When we at inhouscommunityus.com ask in-house counsel what they’re worried about, they usually tick off data privacy and cybersecurityu as issues that keep them up at night. And don’t think that this year privacy is going away, as continuing revelations about Big Tech’s data mining, and a presidential election roil the public debate. To that […]
If one sentence could sum up legal practice in the English-speaking world this year, it would be this quote from The Leopard by the Sicilian novelist Giuseppe Tomaso di Lampedusa: “If we want things to stay as they are, things will have to change.” On the surface, most things looked the same; law firms still exist, […]
There’s a battle going on. A polite one, to be sure, at least most of the time. But it’s a battle nonetheless, between general counsel and corporate procurement professionals. The two sides’ stances can be summed up like this: The general counsel wants the legal department, and only legal department, to hire outside law firms. […]
Comment
Legal Spending
News
Operations
Survey says legal departments increasingly turn away from law firms
In an ever-changing market, with constant corporate pressure to cut costs yet take on more work, corporate law departments are shifting from hiring more lawyers to making better use of what they’ve got. And, here’s a big one, for certain kinds of work, they’re shifting from calling on outside counsel to hiring other kinds of […]
