Want To Mess With Opposing Counsel’s Head? Send Them A Letter From Hugelaw

Never heard of Hugelaw? Let me explain.

If you are a frequent reader of ATL, you are no stranger to the term Biglaw.

Biglaw usually refers to those few hundred plus attorney firms. The ones law students clamor to join, but few are able to. The ones with starting salaries that make you blush and bonuses big enough to make you forget about your student loan debt, even if just for a day.

As in-house, I am used to dealing with Biglaw. Generally Biglaw makes for formidable opposing counsels, but I can often manage Biglaw internally without the need to retain the services of my own Biglaw.

Hugelaw, on the other hand, is a different story.

If you are not familiar with Hugelaw, it’s okay. I just coined the term.

Hugelaw is reserved for those few firms that are known even outside of the legal community. Those firms that count their attorneys by the thousands. That post annual revenues that rival companies in the tech industry. The firms that are able to make a seasoned in-house counsel doubt themselves on even the most routine of a matter.

This past week one of my associates entered my office looking as if he had seen a ghost. In his hand was a letter printed on the most brilliant white, and no doubt expensive, piece of paper I have seen. When he handed me the luxe piece of paper, the raised letterhead confirmed what I had feared, it was from a Hugelaw.

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This Hugelaw had been retained to represent one of our business partners with whom we were currently working through, what I had believed, was a rather routine dispute. Sure the monetary value of the dispute was sizable, but nothing our hospital system had not seen before.

In fact, during our regular legal team meeting where we review our outstanding cases to assess our risk and potential need for outside counsel, our group collectively agreed this particular case could be dealt with internally.

It was a common fact pattern we had seen many times before. We had sufficient internal resources available to work on the dispute. And we were rather certain the law was comfortably on our side.

That is to say until we received the letter from Hugelaw.

As I read the letter, it was good, but it raised many of the arguments on similar fact patterns I had heard before. Yet despite my having heard the arguments before, this time I looked at them in a different light. And as I did, doubt began to creep in.

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Was this case really different enough that my previous line of thought is wrong? Did I completely miss the mark on all of my previous legal analyses? Am I even a good lawyer?

After reviewing the letter I quickly assembled our legal team, showed them the letter, and asked if everyone stood by their initial analysis that we did not need outside help. Lo and behold, everyone in the room, myself included, thought that while we were still right, a second set of eyes from the outside couldn’t hurt.

A few days later we heard back from our outside help who confirmed our initial legal analysis, and with a renewed sense of confidence, we pressed forward and ultimately won, just as we had with many similar fact patterns before it.

So to the opposing party, well done. Although we ultimately prevailed, you made me pay an added premium in the form of my outside counsel who we hurriedly engaged out of some latent fear of your Hugelaw.

And to Hugelaw, even though you were unsuccessful, you were still worth your fees to your client. You caused us to second guess our analysis, cost us some sizable legal fees, and will certainly make me think twice the next time I find myself in a dispute with your client.


Stephen R. Williams is in-house counsel with a multi-facility hospital network in the Midwest. His column focuses on a little talked about area of the in-house life, management. You can reach Stephen at stephenwilliamsjd@gmail.com.