Outsourcing - Such a hated word. Especially when it happens to American jobs. Accept it. Just like you did with computers and the internet. Its now a global economy. You can either resist the change and stick to your abacus or say, 'Heck! I'll see how best can I use it for my advantage.' The same paradigm applies to the legal field. Legal Outsourcing (the onshore type) has been around for over a couple of decades if not more. Now offshoring it is just a step up (or down depending on your perspective). So legal work is being compartmentalized, piecemealed and made efficient! Is that such a bad thing? The legal field much like the medical one, has been protected for the longest time. Protected or impenetrable markets tend to become oligopolies, and we all know what happens with that! (case and point the oil prices). I have read at least one article every month on grievances against the billable hour. But is anything tangible being done about it? There have been innovations where terms like value billing have been thrown in, yet one begs the question if it was that effective why has it not been adopted throughout the legal world or atleast by a substantial portion of it? Legal Outsourcing is here to stay. It will make this market leaner and more efficient. It DOES offer greater efficiency with the time difference working to our advantage and the reduced labor costs (albeit this is not going to last forever). The labor pool might have a learning curve right now but will get better - soon. More than anything else it offers an alternative in many cases where there was none. The legal community should take a closer look at what legal outsourcing might be all about and see if it can benefit them and possibly make their lives easier.

In two recent federal cases, where LegalEase Solutions was involved in assisting plaintiffs' counsel with drafting of trial and appellate briefs, the court decided in favor of LegalEase clients. The first was a Federal Eastern District (Michigan) Court case invovling claims of civil rights violation by an African American man whose house was searched without a warrant. The defendant police department had filed a motion for summary judgment and the court ruled aginst the motion with respect to the plaintiff's fourth amendment claims.

The second case was a 6th Circuit Court of Appeals case also involving a plaintiff whose civil rights were violated when he was arrested and beaten while driving an ice cream truck through a neighborhood. With the help of LegalEase, the 6th Circuit reversed the district court's decision granting defendant municipality's motion for summary judgment.

GCs Vent Their Frustrations About Outside Counsel
Petra Pasternak
The Recorder
May 23, 2006

Richard Gray is not fond of surprises.

Not the kind that arrive when Gray, the Claria Corp. general counsel, is on a conference call with the company's entire board of directors and his outside counsel brings up a new legal requirement or a potential problem for the first time.

Caught off guard, Gray said he once had to scramble to field the initial questions and save what could have turned into a precarious situation by telling his bosses he would look into the matter and present it at a later time. "That's not a warm and fuzzy feeling," he said. "It worked out fine, but I should never be put in that position."

Surprises are just one thing outside counsel are well-advised to keep out of their repertoire if they want to earn a GC's love.

According to a study published this year by BTI Consulting Group Inc., a Massachusetts-based legal consulting firm, only about 30 percent of GCs nationwide were satisfied with their primary law firms in 2005, down from 43.5 percent the previous year. The picture was a little rosier in Northern California, but satisfaction still dropped from 60.2 percent in 2004 to 56.8 percent last year.

BTI attributes the decline to three main factors: law firms' failure to keep up with a GC's changing needs, an inability to articulate the value of services delivered and poor communication. The survey included more than 1,000 interviews from corporate counsel at large and Fortune 1000 companies.

Fed up GCs, squeezed by budget constraints and pressure from boards of directors, are reacting to shoddy work by outside counsel by demoting and replacing their primary law firms and spreading the wealth among a larger network of secondary firms.

Nothing is more dangerous than a client who's left to assume a lawyer is playing golf or, worse, napping on their dime. So it's always a good idea to regularly gauge client satisfaction and keep aware of the following pet peeves that have peppered GCs' legal careers for decades:

by Edward Poll
April 2006

Lawyers function best as members of a team. No lawyer can do everything. A paralegal or administrative assistant whose qualifications and skills meet your needs will effectively extend the reach and quality of your practice. You can hire such a person to work full time, on your payroll. However, technology increasingly affords an efficient alternative: the VA, or virtual assistant.

VA Relationship
VAs are paralegals or other administrative specialists who work offsite and online, creating work product to your specifications and tailored to your practice. They represent an extension of the outsourcing that lawyers and law firms have done for years. Once that outsourcing was limited to mailing and records storage services. More recently it has come to include transcription of voice files for depositions, accounting support for billing, data entry, litigation support graphics, and legal research. Such outsourced services are transparent to the client – to such an extent that they now can be performed a continent away.

The relationship with a virtual assistant is complex and rewarding. As an independent business owner, the VA is neither employee nor subordinate. VAs more closely resemble an accountant or any other business consultant with whom the lawyer has an ongoing, collaborative relationship. They become familiar with your practice and attuned to your business needs as much as any service provider engaged for a substantial length of time.

VA Selection
An excellent example of a virtual assistant practice is The Relief, a Tacoma, Washington-based firm that delivers remote administrative and legal assistant/paralegal support services to solo and small practice professionals. Danielle Keister, principal of The Relief, graciously shared with me her insights on what makes the VA relationship work from the service provider’s perspective. She recommends taking these factors into account when engaging a VA:

Is there an informative, well constructed Web site, as evidence that the VA has the technical skill and sophistication to conduct an effective online business relationship?
Conduct a personal consultation, face to face or by phone. It is not appropriate to ask for resumes or for work history beyond professional references, but the VA should be willing to provide information on experience and qualifications.
Request a business track record. Look for a VA who has been successfully in business for at least three years, and one who is actually IN business (not just working part time or providing an incomplete service package).
Does the VA provide a realistic cost structure? Inappropriately low rates can signal a lack of business sense and indicate a practice that is not profitable (and won’t be around for long). Because you want to rely on the VA long-term, you want assurance that their business is viable. Proper VA rates will average between $30 and $65 per hour. And if the work provided is paralegal in nature, don’t forget that this work can be billable client hours that you can mark up at a profit.
VA Qualifications
Beyond these business considerations, think through the professional qualifications that you want from the VA. If you’re seeking paralegal services, you should expect a certificate of completion from an accredited educational institution. Do your own research on that institution and don’t rely blindly on “ABA-approved” status. Make sure your VA paralegal can demonstrate knowledge of local rules regarding court and civil procedure, in addition to practical insights pertinent to your practice. Other relevant skills include the ability to:

Organize files and chronologies
Prepare documents for summons, complaints, answers, motions and other proceedings
Conduct investigations and summarize depositions
Perform legal research
Coordinate with outside vendors for trial preparation
Create and maintain client files.
A virtual assistant should be able to conduct all these activities electronically from a remote location. That assumes and requires compatible email, word processing, document management and database capabilities. If your word processing system is WordPerfect, engaging a VA who works only in Word can complicate and not simplify your life. The same is true for other software products: Excel versus Lotus, Quicken versus QuickBooks. There are of course other document exchange tools – f ax, overnight courier, even surface mail. But effective electronic integration is a must.

VA Versus Employee
One of the most important considerations about the outsourced VA relationship is to ensure that it is in fact an engagement of an independent contractor. Do not make the mistake of thinking that every part-time or offsite paralegal or legal assistant qualifies. The IRS has very clear guidelines to determine whether a hired individual is an independent contractor or an employee for federal tax purposes. An employee is subject to the will and control of the employer not only as to what shall be done, but as to how it shall be done – an employee does not have independent control of the work process. By contrast, The Relief, as a true independent contractor, states on its Web site: “Our expertise is based on over 20 ears top-level administrative experience and training. Our legal support services for attorneys and investigators are based on paralegal and investigative training and experience.” If you engage a service provider who cannot provide the same assurance, they likely are not a true VA.

VA Versus Temp
Note also that a VA relationship is different from that with a temporary employment agency. Temps can be a viable solution to small firm or solo personnel needs, but if you need anything other than the most basic clerical assistance it would be wise to consider and select a temporary on a long-term basis, known as “temp to perm.” This option accommodates extended projects and protracted litigation, but should only be pursued with a temporary agency that specializes in temporary legal personnel.

The VA Advantage
Virtual assistants are an outsourcing strategy that can give lawyers the best of all solutions to the need for help. You get a professional team member, selected to your criteria, attuned to the business and professional needs of your practice. You are relieved of the cost (and potential liability) that in-house staff can represent. Best of all, you have an efficient solution to “The Business of Law”®, one that frees you to do the client representation and development work that you want to do. As Ms. Keister remarked to me, “ When I first started, I wondered if attorneys were so above the crowd that concerns like working at a profit, operating efficiently, finding ideal clients and dealing with problem ones were just too petty and far beneath them. Since then, I’ve seen that they have the same marketing and operating issues that any other business has.” Help from a knowledgeable virtual assistant can be a major step in resolving them.