Just started in-house and my days are full of meetings with little time in between to analyze or process anything. Is this typical? I keep taking lots of notes but haven’t had a chance to really review and reflect on my notes, to follow up and investigate or do any strategic or legal analysis. Lots of on the fly work for now. Maybe it’s like this just the first few days where I’m getting the lay of the land? But I suspect it’ll be like this for a while… Any tips appreciated.

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In private practice your job was to provide deep and thorough analysis of difficult legal questions. In house your job is to answer the easy legal questions on the fly, give generalized assessment of risks (e.g. have you thought about whether this use of data complies with our privacy policy?), and identify which questions need the deep dive (and then sending those to outside counsel). I think it is the hardest part of the transition.

likehelpful

This is why I don't want to go in house 😬

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This is indeed very typical, especially if you are the 1st in house counsel. I suggest you block your calendar with time you need for thinking and processing, and guard then with your life! Also, you need to start educating the stakeholders in terms of what is required to come to legal and what is not…you cannot deal with everything and this is something you need to deal with. As a lawyer coming from a firm you will struggle with not attending every request, or not attending every request to perfection, but there really is no alternative. You should also remember that you are no longer dealing with like minded professionals, so people will not have the same basis of logic as you, and whilst you should always assume good intentions, you do need to educate on a constant basis.

likesmarthelpful

I’m learning the value of this already.

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Welcome to corporate. You job is Professional Meeting Attender.

likefunny

If you’re onboarding, this sounds 100% normal for the first 3-6 months as you adjust to the company, your role and expectations. Below are my tips from working as an in house transactional lawyer at several different companies (though this may vary by practice area):

- time blocks are key! Block time throughout the day and on a weekly basis to catch up on current work and focus on proactive initiatives. I block Wednesdays 8-10am as focused time.

-Learn patterns of your clients to also see when are busy/less busy times of day/quarter etc, and develop ways to maximize that time (eg standing calls, office hours, etc)

- Sometimes a call is better than an email and vice versa.

- After onboarding, keep meetings to 30mins or less, where possible.

- Most meetings have takeaways and action steps that need to be sent out right away (either you send them or preferably, delegate to someone else during the meeting)

- Delegate delegate delegate. Most in house legal work involves input from others, where possible, delegate to other legal staff (internal or external counsel), back to the business or to other internal stakeholders

-Less is more; perfect answers/best/detailed responses aren’t as important as moving a particular issue along and empowering the business; avoid being the bottle neck or getting yourself in quicksand

- Lean on others, who you trust. Get tips from colleagues or your manager. If you’re the head or solo counsel, lean on your network for tips.

- Not a time management tip, but word of advice, if you’re in a non-corporate function, understand the business. Deeply. Join a ride along or sales pitch, whatever is relevant for your role.

- If the workload remains too demanding (which happens in some companies), build a case for additional support… or consider leaving for an employer with better balance. It’s a hot job market.

Hope this helps!

likehelpful

Very helpful. Thank you.

Thanks. Then I need to figure out a system where I take note of action items properly. I’ve been relying on having the chance to review my notes to do so, but there’s been very little of that so far. Also, I need to figure out how to organize my inbox. On my first day I already had 50 emails. Most of them were from IT and other random company wide stuff but a few were substantive. The point is, I had to go through ALL of them to figure that out.

I feel like a goldfish, living with the memory of one meeting at a time and not really retaining or building my semantic net as thoroughly as I’d like, not being able to identify or appreciate gaps.

It is pretty exciting, I’m good at thinking on my feet. Just an odd way to be. I think I will definitely need to block off time to “process and analyze.”

likehelpful

OP, I am in firm practice still but carry around a blank bullet journal that I use to help organize my thoughts. I have a 2 page spread for each client (you could use a spread for each department or major business issue). I also use a 2 page spread for each week with that week’s to-do items. When I go into a meeting I take notes on a blank page. When an action item comes up, I go ahead and jot it down in my weekly to-dos (short term) and or client page (long term). At the end of the week my undone to-dos either get moved to the next week or moved to the client page (if now longer term or decided to hold on them). I write and X or an arrow so I know whether it got completed or moved.

If you take notes electronically you could still use the bullet journal as your to-do lists/action items. It’s old school but it’s really helped me stay organized and on top of my tasks.

likesmart

I’ve been in-house for 5 months and, yes, this is life now.

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It’s normal, put a few time blocks on your calendar throughout the week for focus time. I also end up having to do most of my substantive drafting at night/ early mornings.

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Probably depends on your specific role in-house and the culture of the internal team you support. In a sales support/ commercial role my experience is that it’s common to attend a lot of meetings throughout the day, and need pretty quick turnaround time on responses to emails and normal drafting activities. If I have a really unusual or complex issue come up more time can be set aside for it.

I just started in house in November and all I do is sit in meetings that mean absolutely nothing. The pay is worth it.

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Totally normal in my experience. I routinely have more than 40 hours of meetings scheduled in a week. I’ve been trying to do a better job of declining non essential meetings

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Yes, welcome to in-house life! I echo what others have said but you also need to learn when you need to be in a meeting and when it’s not necessary. Colleagues may have a tendency to over include legal, so be judicious with what meeting invites to accept, which you will learn over time.

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