Outsourcing: Robert Denney is an honest man

Philly.com conducted an interview with Robert Denney a legal consultant, which is a must read for any contract attorney out there. Much of the interview focused on legal outsourcing. HEre are the highlights:

Q: How much will outsourcing of legal work to India and other offshore sites
affect the industry?

A: That has been a very strong trend in the last few years. India became a center, and now there are other areas. It used to be just research work, but now it is document drafting, particularly for large firms, that need to drive costs down.

Q: Why are they doing this?

A: They are trying to boost their per-partner profit numbers and to
make their clients happy.
It is a combination of both. Clients are really complaining more about their rates, the hourly billing rates. But it is also another way to try and maintain profits.

Q: How reliable is a legal document drafted in Mumbai for use in the United States?

A: Many of these people are graduates of law schools, and the quality of their work is reviewed by lawyers in the United States. Whether they are drafting documents for a federal case, or for use in Pennsylvania, the law firms that
outsource this work make sure that they are well-grounded in the laws of those
venues. The quality control is done back here in Philadelphia.

Q: Do the clients know?

A: Many of them do not. Even those that do, many of them, such as corporate legal departments, also are outsourcing their work. It is the same issue for them, trying to keep costs down.