Earlier this year, I attended the annual CLOC conference in Las Vegas where I had the opportunity to sit in on a session led by Vincent Cordo, head of global litigation sourcing for Shell, addressing how corporate legal departments can transform their interactions with outside counsel.
I’ve seen studies that say that our brains only retain about 6 percent of any presentation, which is why great presenters repeat themselves. In this case, the 6 percent that caught my eye was that, under Vince, Shell has gone from 300 plus outside counsels to 20.
As jaw dropping as those numbers are, the amazing thing to me is that Vincent, who worked for Big Law firms like Reed Smith and Squire Sanders, has been sharing Shell’s blueprint at places like CLOC. It seems to be working because I have been hearing more and more stories from industry insiders about Fortune 500 clients implementing this approach.
Here's how a recent live conversation with Vince on the topic of outside counsel management unfolded.
