Collaborative Synergy: Best Practices for In-House and Outside Counsel Working Together

Collaborative Synergy: Best Practices for In-House and Outside Counsel Working Together

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The relationship between in-house counsel and outside counsel can be quite interesting for a variety of reasons. There are many different models corporation clients use when hiring outside counsel, which leads to the complexity. For some corporate clients they prefer to hire outside counsel in more of a transactional manner, giving outside counsel discrete work with specific—sometimes limited—information. Others prefer to engage outside counsel and want them to operate much more like an extension of the team, learning and understanding the technology and business strategy so they can give advice.

This panel will explore the in-house and outside counsel relationship in search of best practices for creating collaborative synergy. Among other things the panel will discuss:

1.  How do in-house and outside counsel communicate and cooperate to achieve the desired work-product on budget.

2. To what extend corporations use outside counsel? Is it just for drafting applications based on inventor disclosures, or do they sit in on meetings with engineers and scientists?

3. How much of a partnership is ideal for corporate clients to have with the outside counsel (i.e., is it more than just drafting)?

4. What type of technology should be used to communicate with outside counsel, while still maintaining privilege and confidentiality?

5. Fixed fee vs. hourly fee arrangements, and when and how to approach in-house counsel when the scope of the project is creeping and the work envisioned cannot realistically be done for the typical rate.