Legal news and trends for Canadian in-house counsel and c-suite executives
Issue link: https://digital.canadianlawyermag.com/i/50877
members' legal billing would be done on a value basis by 2012. That goal may end up being easier to achieve than first thought. As Krebs says of the initiative's first year, "We thought we would be in the persuasion mode much longer, we are now very much into the how-to mode." The "how-to mode" is something Murray Aust, global director of exter- nal legal resources for Royal Bank of Canada, deals with every day. As one of the largest consumers of legal services in Canada, RBC has taken cost control to another level. Aust wouldn't say the exact amount of RBC's outside legal budget, only that the outside budget is double what the bank spends in-house. It does not have the 100-per-cent value billing that FMC boasts, but they are beyond the ACC benchmark already. "When you look at our total spend, in terms of bills paid for work done for Royal Bank, whether that is paid by our Initially what our effort was aimed at . . . and what it was all about, was persuasion. . . . With the economic downturn that provided impetus and momentum, things picked up and moved much more rapidly than we had thought or anticipated. FRED KREBS, Association of Corporate Counsel clients or ourselves, we are over 25 per cent now," Aust says, in reference to the ACC benchmark. "But we are not comfortable at all with that. We should be doing way better . . . we are probably closer to 50 per cent." For RBC the path it is taking to a greater percentage of value billing is also to break down the law firm's tradition business model. The idea of describing productivity as more lawyers and more hours is not one that works for RBC. It is working toward what Aust characterizes as "the profitability model," which is about mirroring a law firm's business practice with that of its clients. One area RBC is using such a model is in project management. This is basic- ally game planning every action the -iscover reainess reenion oic iiaion o mee coner ocumen review orensic aa coecion euicaion eecronic courroom ecnooies rainin conerences ria rocessin reservaion ewor searc rooco winess examinaion -iin securi oicies coss reucion non ier -evience inormaion manaemen overnance ris comiance iiaion reareness Untitled-3 1 INHOUSE DECEMBER 2009/JANUARY 2010 • 11/27/09 11:10:17 AM 25