In-house counsel who participated in Canadian Lawyer’s 2019 Corporate Counsel Survey place more importance on historical relationships than on expertise when it comes to selecting external law firms. Of the 137 participants, 66.42 per cent consider loyalty to existing firms to be a top priority, while only 52.55 per cent make the selection based on industry and practice area expertise, in contrast to last year’s survey, which saw industry expertise as the top choice. Specific lawyers are also a driving force for 59.85 per cent this year, while law firm reputation is relatively unimportant with only 34.31 per cent saying they take it into consideration in the selection process.

In line with these results, Peter Nguyen, general counsel, corporate secretary and privacy officer at Resolver, typically goes back to the same firms he has used in the past or will, on occasion, ask his peers for a referral to someone with whom they have personally worked. However, Lorne O’Reilly, lead counsel at the Dow Chemical Company, believes expertise is more important than prior history with a firm.

“I want the person for the job who is going to give Dow the best value for the specific task at hand,” he says. “If I have a competition issue, I may not have a historical firm, but I’m going to find that individual who has provided the most expert experience and maybe she is the one who is going to demonstrate to me the opportunity for value drivers in other areas.”

Elisabeth Demone, vice president, chief legal officer and secretary at Symcor, values lawyers with whom she has worked and says she would not hesitate to follow a lawyer who moves to a different firm.

Diversity is still not a significant consideration for most, although the number of respondents asking law firms to provide a diverse roster of lawyers has risen slightly with 16.79 per cent now making this request, versus 11.11 per cent last year. Close to 68 per cent say they do not make this request. Some respondents left comments to indicate why seeking diversity is still not top of mind, with one writing: “Law firms tend to staff files without asking,” Another wrote that they were “trying to minimize the number of lawyers/firms working on our file.”

Nguyen says the interest in working with a diverse roster is not where is should be, although he recognizes that it would not be considered a significant issue for smaller firms.

“For large organizations, diversity would be top of mind; but for smaller organizations, it may or may not be relevant, especially in regard to the relationship with external counsel,” he says.

For the fifth consecutive year, litigation is the top issue being sent to outside firms, with 77.37 per cent of respondents indicating they seek outside help for litigation matters. Employment and labour issues came in second at 62.77 per cent. Most firms don’t have a lot of internal litigators, so seeking outside help is essential.’