Legal News

Report: Chief Legal Officers Finding Happiness In-House

By Dan Slater

Given governance reforms and increased scrutiny, we here at the Law Blog suspected that the long-coveted in-house counsel job might’ve lost its luster. How wrong we were.

According to the results of the Association of Corporate Counsel’s 8th Annual Chief Legal Officer Survey, 85 percent of CLOs (a/k/a general counsel) found their careers to be rewarding and “welcomed opportunities to expand their roles and the support they provided to their clients.” (Out of the 5,355 members polled, 1,166 responded.)

“I’m not surprised at the survey results,” said Roderick Palmore, the general counsel at General Mills. Mr. Palmore said that in the post-Enron era of stepped-up compliance and regulation, many in-house lawyers have taken on more responsibility and, along the way, derived more happiness from their jobs. Says Mr. Palmore: “Perhaps [in-house jobs are] complicated by some of the new regulations, but that level of satisfaction may be facilitated by those regulations, too.”

For law firm partners and senior associates out there wondering how their day-to-day might change if they move in-house, here’s the break-down: The survey results also found that CLO’s and General Counsel continue to spend the majority of their time on corporate transactional work, followed by compliance and board relations. Respondents indicated that records management would be the next significant issue that GC’s would tackle in 2008, followed closely by staff recruiting, retention and training.

“When you’re a partner in a law firm, your practice is going to be focused, relative to being inside,” says Palmore, a former partner at Sonnenschein Nath & Rosenthal. “When you’re in the CLO chair, everything is in your scope.” As general counsel, says Palmore, you’ve always got to be asking yourself, why does the company need me?

Full post as published by Law Blog - WSJ.com on April 22, 2008 (boomark / email).