alt.legal: Alex Dimitrief, General Counsel Of GE, Says There's 'No Such Thing As A Small Case'

Can a single lawyer embody the best of traditional legal practice and all the promise of legal innovation? Meet Alex Dimitrief, GC of GE.

Alex Dimitrief

Alex Dimitrief

Can a single lawyer embody the best of traditional legal practice while embracing all of the promise of legal innovation? Alex Dimitrief, the general counsel of General Electric, sure does, and he is “seeing great ideas coming from all over the world.”

Recall from our last column that Dimitrief is a graduate of Yale College (1981) and Harvard Law (1985), a former White House Fellow under the Reagan Administration, and a litigation partner at Kirkland & Ellis. Today he is the top lawyer commanding General Electric’s legal department. My coauthor Ed Sohn aptly described Dimitrief as “immediately among the greatest lawyers I’ve ever shared a room with.”

In the second half of our interview with Dimitrief, you will hear about why he’s “excited about the future of our profession.” Attention to the legal innovators out there, GE is noticing! Amen.

These twenty minutes of audio are bursting with wisdom, so I urge all our readers to listen to this from beginning to end. But for all you innovators too busy hustling to make time, enjoy some of my favorites themes from the conversation.

On Writing Well: “we have pretty heavy red pens.”

Last week, Dimitrief argued that “the art of writing should not be a lost art. It is more important to the legal profession than ever.” He emphasized that “[w]hen I get a draft from a law firm that I don’t need to rewrite, I’m relieved.” Take note, law firms: GE has “pretty heavy red pens.”

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In the second half of the interview, Dimitrief commented on how technology can remove “scut-work” and enable law firm attorneys to focus on their writing and other core legal skills:

If you can get the scut-work out of the way, if you can avoid having the grind of associates sitting at a law firm just reviewing emails 15 hours a day, and instead have those young women and men who come to law firms do what they came to law firms to do, which is focus on writing, focus on advocacy, focus on depositions, focus on negotiations, get away from the drudgery … how much better would our profession be?

And that’s what technology is going to enable.

Amen! Legal innovation should be like a time machine, focusing your mind on the core skills of an advocate – the skills you learned in law school.

On The Need for Innovation: “I’m seeing great ideas coming from all over the world.

Dimitrief acknowledged that the legal industry is becoming far more complex, and that innovative solutions are needed.

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Focusing on the explosion of data in litigation, Dimitrief tells the story of a “huge case” he managed as an associate at Kirkland, in which discovery amounted to a then-whopping “200 boxes” full of documents. Oh, how the world has changed:

You can’t keep applying the same rules as when 200 boxes was a big case to a system where 200 boxes is a small routine case … you have to be receptive to new ways of doing things.

And if you don’t embrace everything that technology has to offer in terms of artificial intelligence . . . you are wasting your time, but you are also making your law firm the type of place where the best and brightest are not going to want to come work.

Dimitrief stated plainly that he “want[s] to hear about the new ideas and where they are coming from.” So how does he keep his finger on the pulse of legal innovation? Three ways: (1) he has “a big team,” which stays abreast of innovations; (2) some of GE’s law firms bring new technologies directly to the company’s attention, and GE “really credit[s]” those that do; and (3) he “reads columns like [alt.legal].” (See that! Please remember, apply to our alt.legal innovation awards and show the world’s biggest companies that you too are an agent of positive change).

Finally, because the promise of legal process outsourcing lured Ed and me out of Big Law, we had to ask his thoughts on our little corner of the industry. Dimitrief believes LPO is “part of the future” and that if done right, it is actually “energizing for law firm partners and associates.” Phew, career intact!

On Hiring Law Firms and Accountability: “what can I do, I hired Cravath.”

Dimitrief discussed why his company looks in-house to handle legal issues, versus when they hire law firms.

Like any great litigator, Dimitrief begins with the clearest case: Law firms are going to continue to have a huge advantage in complex litigation due to their bandwidth and ability to dedicate a team. As you litigators out there well know, trial work is all consuming, and in-house counsel cannot disappear for three months.

In terms of the quality, however, he puts his in-house counsel and law firms on the same footing. In fact, he beamed with pride when talking about his investigations team at GE under Katy Choo. “The quality of their work is equal to any law firm’s work in this area.”

Next, Dimitrief emphasized that contrary to popular belief, you don’t outsource risk by hiring a fancy law firm. He stated plainly that he is accountable only to GE CEO Jeff Immelt and the Board of Directors:

I know there is an old wives’ tale in the profession.

There is this legend in the profession that one of the safest things in-house lawyers can do is hire a name brand, a white-shoe Wall Street law firm, on the theory that if something goes wrong you say ‘well, what can I do, I hired Cravath, I hired Weil Gotshal, I hired Wachtell.’

I just think the time for that excuse has gone by.

Regardless of what firm he hires, the firms should consider themselves warned: “if we get a case up [to the U.S. Supreme Court] on cert, I’m arguing it.” The litigating force is strong in this one!

But Wait, There’s More: the “silent majority” of lawyers.

If you are a lawyer in need of a morale boost, take heed: Dimitrief believes that times are good. For all the “pissing and moaning” in the legal profession, he believes that there is a “silent majority” that is deeply proud of the profession, what it has accomplished, and what lies ahead. We agree.

The full interview covers all the topics above, as well as alternative fee arrangement (“aspirational, we are not really there yet”); going in-house after being a Biglaw partner (“reenergizing”); and the Ronald McDonald House (“a safe haven for people that desperately need a safe haven”).

Enjoy!

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Earlier: alt.legal: The General Counsel Of GE Thinks Lawyers Are The Answer


Joe Borstein is a Global Director with Thomson Reuters Legal Managed Services, delivering Pangea3 award-winning legal outsourcing services and employing over 1800 full-time legal, compliance, and technology professionals across the globe. He and his co-author Ed Sohn each spent over half a decade as associates in BigLaw and were classmates at Penn Law.

Joe manages a global team dedicated to counseling law firm and corporate clients on how to best leverage Thomson Reuters legal professionals to improve legal results, cut costs, raise profits, and have a social life. He is a frequent speaker on global trends in the legal industry and, specifically, how law firms are leveraging those trends to become more profitable. If you are interested in entrepreneurship and the delivery of legal services, please reach out to Joe directly at joe.borstein@tr.com.

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