LawBank presented a General Counsel roundtable discussing the effects of COVID-19, as well as best practices on selecting outside counsel. The program featured speakers Bret Richmond, Matt Spohn, and Mo Watson. Bret is General Counsel at Weifield Group Electrical Contracting. Matt serves as General Counsel at Red Canary. Mo is General Counsel at CQG, Inc. Each speaker brought their personal experiences as in-house counsel to the roundtable discussion.
This lunchtime program, which took place on November 4, 2020, focused on how COVID has changed business operations. One of the biggest challenges businesses have faced is maintaining connection and company culture in a remote environment. General Counsel are having to navigate exposures and outbreaks, and some businesses are investing in experts to manage the growth they continue to experience. Another topic of discussion was how businesses measure their spend on outside counsel. For many businesses, legal spend has gone up this year with regard to outside counsel. When it comes to choosing between “Big Law” and smaller or solo practices, General Counsel recognize that there are many benefits to selecting small or solo firms. Often, independent firms can be better client managers for their case, and they allow more predictability and control when it comes to fees. However, when it comes to hiring, General Counsel can influence what firms are hired, but they have to defer to leadership on who outside counsel will ultimately be. To leadership, larger firms can seem to offer a “one-stop-shop,” giving them access to legal advice on nuanced issues.
Speakers also addressed how they view outside lawyers’ value and what value means to them outside of just legal fees and costs. For them, value is a process—they want to be kept informed, so they can inform their business associations and feel confident that their legal issue is being handled well. General Counsel relies on outside counsel for many things. They like being provided with information in a digestible way (summarize key points) since they typically hire outside counsel for issues that they do not have the bandwidth for. There are many ways to source outside counsel, but General Counsel most often relies on word of mouth, peer referrals and recommendations, and personal relationships. When selecting outside counsel, diversity continues to be a factor, but is not the only one. General Counsel appreciates the difference in perspective that comes from diverse teams, and they try to be mindful of diversity. Finally, the speakers discussed their thoughts on solo and small firms pitching to them. Since it is challenging to get a business team to sit down and hear a pitch from a law firm, it is important to be specific during your pitch and focus on the value you bring to show that you are an asset to their business.
To view the full presentation, click here. If you are interested in viewing upcoming programs hosted by LawBank, visit the events page.
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