American Bar Association Defines Outsourcing as a Salutary Trend

There is little new in the recently released ABA Opinion, that we haven’t read before in the previous Opinions of the New York State, LA County, San Diego and Florida Bar Associations. Several of my peers within the legal outsourcing community have already commented on the Opinion and I don’t intend to delve into it in great detail here. Readers of my blog are reminded that on September 9th, I will be hosting an MCLE Ethics webinar, specifically dealing with the ethical obligations incumbent upon US attorneys outsourcing legal work overseas. I’ll devote some additional time during the webinar to the Opinion. I will raise one point now that struck me as somewhat novel about the ABA Opinion, as opposed to those by the aforementioned Bar associations. That is, the noticeably conciliatory tone utilized with regards to both outsourcing generally and specifically within the legal profession. I’ve highlighted below one quote that caught my eye.

The outsourcing trend is a salutary one for our globalized economy

I believe this one sentence above anything else contained within the body of the Opinion indicates the ABA’s underlying attitude. I expect that once and for all, we can now put to bed, the issue of the ethical permissibility of offshore legal outsourcing.

The Opinion is useful in that it provides an extended checklist that I have paraphrased below for US attorneys contemplating outsourcing legal work overseas. My peers within the reputable LPO world would regard these practices as nothing more or less than routine, common sense, due diligence. The Opinion does not state that all of the below must be done, however, I encourage US attorneys, wherever possible, to follow these helpful pointers.

• Conduct reference checks.

• Investigate the background of the lawyers, non-lawyers and service provider.

• Interview the principal lawyers involved in your matters and assess their educational background.

• Inquire into the LPO’s hiring practices to evaluate the quality and character of the employees likely to have access to client information.

• Investigate the security of the provider’s premises and computer network.

• Conduct a site visit.

• Assess the country to which services are being outsourced for its legal training, judicial system, legal landscape, disciplinary system and core ethical principals.

• Disclose the outsourcing relationship to the client, and obtain informed consent.


Click here for the full Opinion. For any readers interested in attending the MCLE webinar on September 9th please email me: mross@law-scribe.com