Does your legal department work for you?

I'm working on a project with my publishers John Wiley & Sons, Inc. that will be released sometime in 2010. No, I am not writing a new book, but it is too early to talk about what I'm cooking up just yet. When we're ready to announce, this blog will be the first place that I spread the word.

I need your permission

Anyway, I'm interviewing people around the world about their marketing successes and will be using some select quotes in material that will eventually be published in book form. The Wiley legal department requires a release to be signed in order for people to appear in the book. A signed release like this is very common.

People are very excited to have their work profiled in a book and everyone agrees to sign the release. But some people must kick the simple one-page document "upstairs to legal for signoff."

Legal signoff - Oh no! The dreaded words!

In my experience, when the lawyers get involved, the wheels of commerce often slow down to a crawl or sometimes even stop spinning. It is appalling. Now I'm not saying all legal people are a bad bunch. Hey, I have had some great experiences with lawyers. And some of my friends are lawyers. However, in my experience with a simple request like this, more times than not things slow things down to a snails pace.

One person said, and I quote: "I need to send this to the business prevention department." OMG – can you imagine calling your legal department the business prevention department? It must really be terrible to work there!

Another person kept assuring me the "legal is looking at it." For a month! We're talking about a one-page document that simply gives my publisher the right to print some quotes in a book. I finally got the signed form back after something like 45 days.

Another legal department sat on the form for weeks and weeks and finally the person I interviewed came back to me and sheepishly said: "I need to pass on this opportunity. Legal said no." UGH. All I want to do is quote you in a book. Hours of work on both of our parts down the drain.

It's not all bad

Today I received a signed form back in less than 24 hours. That's amazing because I am in Boston and the person I was sending the form to is based in Hong Kong (our business hours don't overlap). The legal guy looked it over and in a moment said: "Looks good to me."

Shouldn't all legal departments be that fast?

Does your legal department work for you? Or do you work for them?

For more reading about the legal eagles, please check out this post
When lawyers get in the way of PR

Image credit: Shutterstock

Comments

[Matt]

It seems like legal departments define success as "problems/roadblocks identified" not "growth/progress achieved".

Thankfully there are new-model legal firms arriving that understand "growth" as the goal. (The guys over at http://www.outsidegc.com and a few other on-demand type firms for example. )

Business prevention, I could not agree more.

[Jodi Kaplan]

Business Prevention Department? Dear God!

Reminds of my dad's recent experience trying to buy something. He called the company and the only option was to spell out an employee's name to reach them. No "press 1 for sales" or "Press 0 for an operator."

He had to guess at names to find someone! The company apparently wanted to keep customers in the dark (even though they sold light bulbs).

Talk about business prevention!

Oh, and feel free to quote me anytime (grin).

[Seth Godin]

David,

In this case, though, it's Wiley that's causing the problem.

There is no legal reason (none) for the nonsense that Wiley makes authors go through. Fair use is embedded in our Constitution and it gives you the absolute right to quote people you interview. Period.

Superstitious lawyers at Wiley (I'm not going to accuse them of looking for things to do, but I'm happy to accuse them of being silly) put authors like you through this ringer for no reason at all. Do you think Bob Woodward gets people to sign legal releases when he interviews them?

It bothers me when I'm asked to sign these, and I generally refuse. If enough authors say no, maybe they'll stop wasting our time.

[Eric Riback]

It comes down to how they understand their mission. If a lawyer believes her mission is to protect the enterprise, as opposed to building business, then she'll act accordingly. I was always impressed with the lawyers at my most recent job in that they were business-oriented.

Analogous to that is finance people. If they believe their mission is to prevent bad debt, as opposed to increasing profit, they will take little risk rather than moderating risk with opportunity.

I do agree with the commenter that a release should not be necessary to run a quote. So it's not unreasonable that the lawyer from the other side looks askance at a document that shouldn't even need to exist.

In terms of turnaround time, the lawyers at many companies are way overburdened and it's easy to see annoying documents like this being at the bottom of the pile even though it would take only a minute to review and approve. Fortunately, I've generally worked in environments where I felt free not to send such stuff up to legal before signing if I clearly understood it.

[David Meerman Scott]

Thanks all, for your comments.

Seth - holy cow. I just assumed that it was required for some legal reason. I'll have to have a little talk with my friends at Wiley! Thanks for letting me know.

David

[Michael Sanjek]

I've experienced scenarios where legal was not just the "business" prevention department, but more directly the "sales" prevention department.

Customers were required to provide so much info and sign off on so many documents that a simple transaction looked like a mortgage refinance.

It must be that litigious society we live in.

[Omar Halabieh]

I am currently managing a software development project. This project involves purchasing a specific software library to assist us in the process. As usual we obtained the contract that was to be signed. I reviewed it from a technical perspective and made a few changes which the vendor happily accepted. I was then aware that our legal department has to review it. I admit that the turnaround was quick (within 24 hours) but the amount of edits was more than the content of the contract itself. The vendor didn't bother with arguing any of the changes, since the cost of the software wouldn't be enough to cover lawyer fees! I think legal needs to always take a pragmatic view about what is the value added they are providing and if it justifies the high cost that is usually associated.

Regards,
Omar

[michael webster]

I am an attorney, and generally support Seth Godin's view.

But, it does depends on how much is being quoted to qualify as fair use.

My solution would be to: simply notify the author that you believe that your quote constitutes fair use, and that unless you hear back from them within 30 days, you will assume that they agree, is a useful compromise.

Will it work all the time? No, but it probably cuts out a lot of silly time wasting.

[John White]

David:

Why don't you interview somebody in one of these legal departments and get his/her perspective?

[John Wall]

Just as important as in-house counsel's perspective is the perspective of those who manage in-house counsel. A big part of it is getting on the same page as far as what is considered an acceptable amount of risk for the organization.

If management creates an environment that views litigation as the cardinal sin of the legal department you've built a perfect garden to grow a business prevention unit.

Keeping compensation tied to reaching financial goals can keep everyone focused on the prize rather than bureaucracy building.

[Jamie Favreau]

I totally agree that they should work for you... but I also see the point in having a great legal dept especially when it comes to software. When the person, totally wrecked havoc on the non profit. When dealing with software is one thing but when dealing with quotes are a different matter.
I mean how long does it take to write a disclosure? Aren't they pretty much standard these days?

[David Meerman Scott]

Thanks all for these comments. It is clearly a more complicated issue than I made it out to be. As Seth said, I may not even need the forms to begin with but my publisher's legal department is playing CYA.