As the title says, I'm curious if anybody here has in-house counsel to review contracts, insurance, etc, and if so, any details you feel like sharing, such as firm size, typical project types and/or budgets, and geographical area. Feel free to keep it as vague as you wish, and many thanks to those who do share.
I'll start - we don't have this, but several years ago we were named in a lawsuit (thrown out) and as our contracts and work typologies get more complex by the day, I'm starting to wonder if it might be worth it (not that we can afford it yet). We're about 30 people and do lots of work in healthcare...
Thanks
Non Sequitur
Apr 9, 24 5:43 pm
BB, we don’t have in house legal, but did so a long long time ago for large gov competitions. We have a business lawyer for a current expansion project outside of our main province but they charge 700$/hr so it’s a in case or emergency type thing.
We do reach out often to the OAA’s professional practice advisors for contract clauses and whatnot.
bowling_ball
Apr 9, 24 9:06 pm
Speaking of OAA, are you going to the conference in Niagara in May? If so, we should grab a drink
Non Sequitur
Apr 10, 24 12:42 am
Good idea, but no. I can't make it. that's too bad, would have been fun.
reallynotmyname
Apr 9, 24 5:56 pm
I think Gensler has one in-house counsel per region, so that's 10 attorneys serving 6000 employees or 1 per 600 staff.
I think 30 people is too small to fund an in-house counsel full-time unless you somehow got them to do other tasks as well.
One alternative would be to engage an outside attorney and build a steady working relationship with them where they handle your contracts and get to know your needs.
You don't necessary need the fanciest and most expensive lawyers in town for Architects-Owner and Architect-Consultant agreements. Or maybe there's a semi-retired attorney out there who would work for you part-time.
Some firms around me have a paralegal on staff who functions as a "contract specialist" and handles AIA contracts. They seem to have trouble keeping the position filled, though. And a non-attorney employee can get into some dangerous weeds when people want to start amending AIA agreements.
bowling_ball
Apr 9, 24 6:04 pm
I really like that idea of a paralegal. We are in the process of rebuilding our firm after the previous owners left us a great portfolio of relationships, but absolutely nothing in terms of standards or the like. Which we've known all along, and why we're exploring different options to keep us on the straight and narrow. Thanks
reallynotmyname
Apr 9, 24 6:25 pm
A knowledgeable professional liability insurance agent can also be a great resource for developing a set of standard modifications to AIA contracts. They can give some direction about the gaps in AIA agreements for an attorney to work on towards developing into a final product.
bowling_ball
Apr 9, 24 8:53 pm
This is where it started for us - having our insurer review some of our contracts, and they alerted us to some very important info that had gone, to that point, more or less completely unaddressed. Good call.
bowling_ball
Apr 9, 24 8:53 pm
Sorry. That was a response to reallynotmyname if it's not clear. Thanks again
natematt
Apr 9, 24 5:58 pm
Corporate firm. We have 5 lawyers right now. Mostly for contract review, paperwork, and handling legal issues that come up. On the off occasion we get sued we always have external counsel though. In-house does not represent us in that capacity.
Every once and a while I’ll CC our regional person on an email responding to someone else. Usually when a client or someone is asking for us to do something illegal and I’m explaining to them that it’s a hard no. Or when it’s about something that seems like it will really piss someone off.
On a personal note, they all seem to enjoy their jobs more than the architects haha.
Chad Miller
Apr 9, 24 6:57 pm
We don't have an in house lawyer however we do have a lawyer. I'm not sure of the arrangement with the lawyer. It's possibly some type of retainer but I'm not certain.
We're a 13 person firm located in community with a population around 450k. We work on the western slope of Colorado (everything west and south of the central ski areas). We typically work on public projects, schools, fire stations, public works, and local government. Our project budgets range from $10 - $150 million.
sameolddoctor
Apr 9, 24 11:30 pm
I used to work in a large corporate international firm. The CEO was a lawyer and all contracts used to get a look from him.
As the title says, I'm curious if anybody here has in-house counsel to review contracts, insurance, etc, and if so, any details you feel like sharing, such as firm size, typical project types and/or budgets, and geographical area. Feel free to keep it as vague as you wish, and many thanks to those who do share.
I'll start - we don't have this, but several years ago we were named in a lawsuit (thrown out) and as our contracts and work typologies get more complex by the day, I'm starting to wonder if it might be worth it (not that we can afford it yet). We're about 30 people and do lots of work in healthcare...
Thanks
BB, we don’t have in house legal, but did so a long long time ago for large gov competitions. We have a business lawyer for a current expansion project outside of our main province but they charge 700$/hr so it’s a in case or emergency type thing.
We do reach out often to the OAA’s professional practice advisors for contract clauses and whatnot.
Speaking of OAA, are you going to the conference in Niagara in May? If so, we should grab a drink
Good idea, but no. I can't make it. that's too bad, would have been fun.
I think Gensler has one in-house counsel per region, so that's 10 attorneys serving 6000 employees or 1 per 600 staff.
I think 30 people is too small to fund an in-house counsel full-time unless you somehow got them to do other tasks as well.
One alternative would be to engage an outside attorney and build a steady working relationship with them where they handle your contracts and get to know your needs.
You don't necessary need the fanciest and most expensive lawyers in town for Architects-Owner and Architect-Consultant agreements. Or maybe there's a semi-retired attorney out there who would work for you part-time.
Some firms around me have a paralegal on staff who functions as a "contract specialist" and handles AIA contracts. They seem to have trouble keeping the position filled, though. And a non-attorney employee can get into some dangerous weeds when people want to start amending AIA agreements.
I really like that idea of a paralegal. We are in the process of rebuilding our firm after the previous owners left us a great portfolio of relationships, but absolutely nothing in terms of standards or the like. Which we've known all along, and why we're exploring different options to keep us on the straight and narrow. Thanks
A knowledgeable professional liability insurance agent can also be a great resource for developing a set of standard modifications to AIA contracts. They can give some direction about the gaps in AIA agreements for an attorney to work on towards developing into a final product.
This is where it started for us - having our insurer review some of our contracts, and they alerted us to some very important info that had gone, to that point, more or less completely unaddressed. Good call.
Sorry. That was a response to reallynotmyname if it's not clear. Thanks again
Corporate firm. We have 5 lawyers right now. Mostly for contract review, paperwork, and handling legal issues that come up. On the off occasion we get sued we always have external counsel though. In-house does not represent us in that capacity.
Every once and a while I’ll CC our regional person on an email responding to someone else. Usually when a client or someone is asking for us to do something illegal and I’m explaining to them that it’s a hard no. Or when it’s about something that seems like it will really piss someone off.
On a personal note, they all seem to enjoy their jobs more than the architects haha.
We don't have an in house lawyer however we do have a lawyer. I'm not sure of the arrangement with the lawyer. It's possibly some type of retainer but I'm not certain.
We're a 13 person firm located in community with a population around 450k. We work on the western slope of Colorado (everything west and south of the central ski areas). We typically work on public projects, schools, fire stations, public works, and local government. Our project budgets range from $10 - $150 million.
I used to work in a large corporate international firm. The CEO was a lawyer and all contracts used to get a look from him.