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In-House Counsel

Legal Literacy

From Hanna Hasl-Kelchner, Associate General Counsel and national counsel for trademark enforcement at Lorillard Tobacco Company.

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Last Entry: March 31, 2011 at 23:25:34

Fess Up When You Mess Up

Posted on June 05, 2008
No one likes to get sued. It’s expensive. It’s time consuming and nobody really wins, except maybe the lawyers. Apologizing may sound like a totally a counter-intuitive move. However, some academic medical centers have discovered they can substantially cut their litigation costs by acknowledging preventable errors and apologizing for their mistakes instead of making excuses and denying them...

How Many Lawyers Does it Take to . . . ?

Posted on June 04, 2008
Fed up with lawyers who overlawyer, Jason Mendelson, a lawyer turned venture capitalist, struck back . He vented his frustration with a blog posting and it generated a lot of feedback. Interestingly, the feedback was positive from entrepreneurs and negative from law firms...

Buyer Beware

Posted on May 21, 2008
Bad experiences often lead to bad legal language. Every strange warning label you’ve ever seen on a product is the result of a lawsuit. Even “warnings” that sound like common sense, such as “do not iron while wearing shirt” are the result of folks seeking common “cents...

Beyond the Law of the Jungle

Posted on May 01, 2008
After a brief sabbatical, Legalliteracy is back; and what better day to return than today — May 1st — Law Day. While some people hiss and boo at lawyers and lawsuits and otherwise poke fun at a profession they think takes itself too seriously, let’s not forget that a mature legal system and rule of [...

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From Lemons to Lemonade

Posted on February 21, 2008
It?s no secret that the U.S. toy industry has been wrestling with product liability issues associated lead based paint used by their foreign suppliers. Indeed, the health and safety of our children is so important that it has caused a shake-up at the Consumer Product Safety Commission and spawned pending legislation in Congress...

You Only Think You Know What I Mean

Posted on January 31, 2008
Reaching an agreement that everyone understands and a document that reflects a true meeting of the minds can be challenging. Besides the implicit and explicit legal meaning attributed to certain words, there are the individual eccentricities, regional differences and international/ cultural differences, as Jared Sandberg points out in a recent Wall Street Journal article that make [...

Quote of the Day: Social Pressures

Posted on January 28, 2008
The social pressures are huge, and some of the good risk procedures are thrown by the wayside. Richard Dunn, a former risk control chief at Merrill Lynch quoted in The Wall Street Journal on Jan. 25, 2008 about the $7.2 billion loss generated by the rogue trader at Societe Generale SA...

ANNOUNCEMENT: Legal Literacy Hits Amazon.com Top 3

Posted on January 16, 2008
I’m pleased to announce that my book, The Business Guide to Legal Literacy briefly hit #3 on Amazon.com’s Legal Guides list. It’s nice to see more folks getting proactive about managing their organization’s legal risks. Thanks to all who are helping to make this useful guide a success and keep spreading the word...

New Year, New Files

Posted on January 01, 2008
In with the new and out with the old. The start of the new year is prime time for making room in overstuffed file cabinets and e-mail folders. Getting organized feels great. But, don’t start purging documents before checking your company’s document retention policy...

BLAWG REVIEW #139

Posted on December 17, 2007
Product recalls for goods made in China have been making the news all year, and last week’s recall by Dollar Tree Stores of 300,000 Chinese baby bead toys and toy cars due to lead was yet more example of how the cheap business solutions are not always the least expensive...

Quote of the Day: E-mails and Bar Conversation

Posted on November 13, 2007
People send e-mails as though they were having conversations with someone in a barR. Scott Meece, global general counsel, senior vice president and secretary of CIBA Vision Corp as quoted by the Fulton County Daily Report The casual nature of e-mail banter is often a rich source of troublesome evidence...

Cookie Cutter Contracts

Posted on November 06, 2007
Standard form agreements simplify business transactions. But when was the last time you read all that tiny print written and sentences that go on forever? And, what about those sections that scream at you in all capital letters? Most clients make the assumption that these preprinted forms are “standard...

The Summer of Recalls

Posted on August 16, 2007
Product recalls are damage control mechanisms. They serve a useful function in keeping our supply chain safe but they are expensive. Last week?s recall by Mattel of 1.5 million toys due to lead paint is estimated to cost the company $35 million. No dollar amount has yet to be placed on Mattel?s recall of another 19 [...

Emperor?s New Clothes ? 2007 Style

Posted on June 27, 2007
The basic premise of Dov Seidman?s new book, ?How,? is that ?how you live your life and ?how? you conduct your business is more important than ever before given the fact that in today?s plugged-in world your actions are more transparent than ever before...

QUOTE OF THE DAY: World Bank Lessons

Posted on May 21, 2007
“I think it was a case of blind arrogance.” Former World Bank General Counsel Roberto Dañino on the Paul Wolfowitz scandal Dañino?s no holds barred interview with Corporate Counsel recounts how Wolfowitz did an end run around the general counsel to avoid advice he didn?t like...

INVESTORS SEEK LEGAL EDGE

Posted on May 11, 2007
Unlike accounting where numbers are tallied in tidy columns and finance where formulas generate rates of return, the law offers no such precision in quantifying its impact on business profitability. But just because the connection is tough to quantify doesn’t mean it doesn’t exist, or that it’s not worth tapping...

HAPPY LAW DAY

Posted on May 01, 2007
President Dwight D. Eisenhower established May 1 as Law Day back in 1958. It’s a good to remember the importance the rule of law plays in our free market economy. The rule of law codifies cultural norms. It etches ethics in stone. It establishes boundaries of right and wrong and in so doing creates certainty and establishes a [...

TWO UNIVERSITIES AND A SHOCK JOCK

Posted on April 17, 2007
Yesterday’s tragic shooting at Virginia Tech as well as last week’s dismissal of criminal charges against the Duke University lacrosse players and the firing of radio shock jock Don Imus all contain valuable lessons for business leaders interested in building a culture of legal compliance...

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