Trials are rare.  Like wins for the Dallas Cowboys or finding gold on Oak Island (seriously, guys give it up!).  If you have been practicing law long enough you know that most commercial litigation never goes to trial (at least here in the USA). Disputes typically get settled either through mediation or on the eve of trial.  Unfortunately, everyone spends a lot of money and time before that eventuality occurs.  This is why it is…

I am sure that by the title alone you realize there will not be a lot of the usual jokes and funny comments in this edition of the blog.  That’s because there is simply nothing humorous about having to fire someone, probably among the most difficult tasks faced by any in-house lawyer who manages people.  After questions about how to show value, the most frequent question I get from readers is “how do I fire…

Antitrust law and Big Tech is hot right now.  BTS/Blackpink K-Pop hot.  Here in the USA at least, where the Department of Justice is on the verge of suing Google for (alleged) competition law violations, the DOJ and the FTC are waist-deep into investigating Big Tech generally, and a panel of the House of Representatives just issued a report calling for the break-up of Big Tech.  In Europe, regulators are looking at specific laws…

This may explain many things about my personality but I have always gone to work feeling like I could get fired any day and at any time.  I am not sure why that is the case (and I am not particularly interested in lying on a couch and talking it out).[1]  I just accept that it’s how I am.  The fear of getting fired has always driven me to find ways to not…

I was recently interviewed by Mel Scott for her awesome the “Counsel” podcast.[1]  I had a lot of fun talking with her and we chatted a good bit offline before she hit “record.”  Part of that discussion was about how the Ten Things blog got started.  If you bought the first Ten Things book, you know the story from the introduction section.  If you haven’t gotten around to shelling out…

Okay, let’s just admit it – 2020 has kind of sucked.  Like an episode of [Not] Finding Bigfoot on Animal Planet (and, hopefully, ten seasons of not finding him will sate everyone’s Bigfoot lust). I read on Facebook that 2020 is proof that time-travel has been invented because someone keeps going back to February 2020 to try and “fix things” but only ends up making everything worse (“killer hornets” for crying out loud…).  It’s also…

I want to pivot away from the “value” discussions that have dominated the last several “Ten Things” posts to get back to some tactical, nuts and bolts problems facing in-house lawyers from the corporate governance-side of things.  I have written about basic corporate governance as well as how to protect your board of directors, but one question I have gotten several times over the past few months is how to prepare proper board of…