Law Department Spend Tilting In-House

According to a law department survey from HBR Consulting, total legal spend, which includes money spent on inside and outside counsel, increased by only two percent worldwide in 2014. This is a percent less than what was reported in HBR’s 2013 survey and three percent less than in the 2012 survey. But inside legal spending levels increased notably, by five percent worldwide. The 2014 survey also points to the beginning of what could be an interesting staffing trend: handling more specialist work in-house. Twenty-eight percent of law departments reported an increase in the number of litigation attorneys compared to 21 percent in the previous year.