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Corporate Counsel Connect collection

August 2013 edition

In this issue

Featured insight


NEW! Nothing's normal
A recurring column with Susan Hackett: The relevance of lawyers in the new normal

Susan HackettThe relevance of lawyers in the new normal
Everyone in the legal industry spends gobs of time these days talking about the relevance of legal service delivery models and how what used to work (and was accepted by clients and corporate legal departments) often doesn't work anymore. I am realizing that focusing on the re-invention of the business model allows us to gloss over a larger issue: the need to re-invent the lawyers themselves who will work in these emerging business models.
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Susan HackettOf income and insights: going behind the scenes of the 2012 in-house counsel compensation report
"People are always interested in how much they are paid." It's a simple truth, spoken by Rees Morrison, half of the force behind the 2012 In-House Counsel Compensation Report. This new report offers a comprehensive view of the earnings within the corporate counsel landscape, offering insights into salary breakdown by industry, tenure, practice area, and more. Corporate Counsel Connect had the opportunity to speak with Bob Graff and Rees on the report itself and some of the trends and issues in in-house compensation today.
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Best practices


Blakeley and MatsuuraEdward Snowden's NSA surveillance revelations and their impact on your organization
After Edward Snowden's disclosures regarding the alleged scope of NSA surveillance of communications involving Americans and others were published, an expanding discussion of the impact of electronic communications monitoring emerged. It is important that businesses understand that the broad communications surveillance described by Snowden has significant implications for organizations.
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Patrick JohnsonRolling the dice: Relying on your ap department
Effectively tracking vendor legal matters and spending are of the utmost importance in efficiently managing even a small legal department. Accounts payable (A/P) software can report on some basic spending categories, but is unable to track vital data that is necessary for the legal department to project and report on the true value it provides.
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In-house perspectives


A year on the solar coaster: An updated profile on Minnesota solar
As the project development manager at Newport Partners, David Streier has seen a lot of change in the past year with new installations, new customers, and new laws enacted by the Minnesota Legislature this spring. We talked about what he has learned and where he sees the solar energy industry headed in Minnesota and across the globe.
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Legal insights


Jeremy Byellin, JDJustice department achieves major victory in apple ebook price-fixing
The tech giant Apple was handed a major blow in the form of a federal court ruling. The ruling, U.S. v. Apple, Inc., was the result of the Department of Justice's antitrust challenge to Apple's alleged electronic book (ebook) price-fixing scheme with five of the biggest book publishers in the U.S. The court found that Apple conspired to violate the Sherman Antitrust Act to restrain trade.
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Alan S. GuttermanUnderstanding the implications of FIRREA
A new wave of claims against financial institutions and rating agencies could breathe new life into a previously moribund law. Federal prosecutors have dusted off the statute books and turned to the Financial Institutions Reform, Recovery and Enforcement Act of 1989 (FIRREA), a two-decade old civil anti-fraud law passed in the wake of the savings and loan crisis, to bring claims related to the most recent financial crisis.
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Alan S. GuttermanSupreme court clarification of definition of "supervisor" does not reduce your need for an effective anti-harassment compliance program
One of the key, if not most important, factors in determining an employer's liability for workplace harassment is the status of the employee accused of engaging in harassment, and case law has drawn a sharp line between co-workers and supervisors. In a decision handed down on June 24, 2013, the Supreme Court mandated a narrower approach by holding that an employee is a "supervisor" for purposes of vicarious liability under Title VII.
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Know-how corner


Updated online behavioral advertising code of conduct; packaging is not a product under conflict minerals rules; law firms and compensation committee advice; rebutting a pattern-or-practice discrimination claim
This month's Know-How Corner contains updates important for those companies engaged in online behavioral advertising, recent SEC staff guidance on reporting obligations under conflict mineral rules, information on the new compensation committee advisor rules, and the latest on pattern-or-practice discrimination claims.
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