In-House Counsel

A speaker at the Legal Week Corporate Counsel Forum this past week was from BAT (British American Tobacco). He mentioned two side benefits from using a legal process offshoring vendor. One was that if routine, commodity chores go to the offshore provider, the workday ennui of the law department's lawyers lessens. They don't face in the same amount the unpleasant task of slogging through uninteresting work.

As a second benefit, he explained that law departments sometimes have trouble obtaining funding for technology projects. If the arrangement with the LPO includes the development of a database, for example, the law department can obtained its technology without wrestling with internal requirements and IT.