Welcome to this first edition of Practical Counsel. Thanks so much for taking the time to read. I hope the issues discussed will be interesting and meaningful to you and that you’ll want to subscribe and actively contribute.
Every week I’ll be looking at an issue raised by you, the readers - lawyers operating in-house in companies and corporations across the globe.
Introducing myself
For those of you who don’t know me, I’m Jonathan Middleburgh. I’m a UK based Brit. I started my career as a Barrister - that’s a Court going litigator; the lawyers who (I kid you not) wear wigs and gowns here in the UK. I specialised in commercial and employment disputes and traipsed around from Court to Court, representing individuals and companies in a very wide range of disputes.
I didn’t love being a practising lawyer and around 10 years into my career as a Barrister I started to study psychology. 12 years in, I took a sabbatical, completed the equivalent of an Undergraduate Bachelors degree in psychology and moved on to, and obtained the equivalent of a Masters degree in, occupational psychology - the psychology of the workplace. After that I decided to quit being a practising lawyer and I started a career as a coach and consultant. Without intending it, within a short time 99% of my clients were within the legal services sector - primarily in-house legal departments and law firms.
I’ve consulted to lawyers all over the world for the past 15 years and a substantial chunk of my work has been consulting to in-house departments.
I know in-house departments and in-house lawyers intimately. I have a thorough understanding of the full range of people issues that crop up within in-house departments - the issues that keep in-house lawyers, whether GCs, CLOs, DGCs, AGCs or Counsel awake at night.
My intention in launching Practical Counsel is to provide a forum where in-house lawyers can share their people issues; where I and GC experts can share our views on those issues; and where in-house lawyers themselves can discuss and debate the best ways to approach those issues.
What I’ve learnt over the years is that there are no cookie-cutter or ‘one-size-fits-all’ solutions. These issues require a nuanced approach and the devil is always in the detail. So refining skills in relation to these issues is truly a life-long endeavour. I’ve worked with Counsel from the CLOs of some of the biggest corporates in the US to one man / one woman legal departments in much smaller companies; and discussed these issues with in-house lawyers from the GC down to the newly minted in-house Counsel. And even the CLO of the Fortune 50 continues to sweat these issues, and continues to learn on the job, and through experience.
How this Works
Every week I’ll be looking at one people issue in some depth - an issue raised by you, the readers. I’m inviting you to write in with your problems and I’ll do my best to try to answer how I think you should tackle those problems.
Here in the UK we call this an ‘agony aunt’ column.
It’s very popular in our newspapers in the UK - both tabloids and broadsheets - to have a column where readers write in with their problems and an expert provides a suggested approach and ‘wise’ counsel. And I know this format is popular around the world, and for good reason.
In fact, parenthetically, the ‘agony aunt’ column apparently started life as the ‘agony uncle’ column. According to an article in the Guardian newspaper, in 1691 a man called John Dunton was having an extra-marital relationship and realised that there was no-one he could ask for advice about that relationship, without revealing his identity. Imbued with an entrepreurial spirit, John Dunton launched a publication called the Athenian Gazette, and the first ‘agony uncle’ column was born. In 1704, Daniel Defoe (later more famous for authoring Robinson Crusoe) started a publication called the Review, and became its agony uncle.
Practical Counsel’s historical roots may go back to the Athenian Gazette and the Review - but the issues I’ll be addressing will be very different than any of those covered in those publications. I will be looking at the people issues that are the day-to-day lot of the in-house Counsel - and I will be giving practical advice and counsel to those Counsel.
My invitation to you is to write in with your people issues. Regard me as the ‘agony uncle’ who will share and hopefully help you manage your pain.
I will never reveal your identity or publish anything that could compromise your confidentiality. The fact pattern or ‘problem issue’ that I will set out in my column will always have certain key facts obscured. Sometimes it will be a composite or amalgam of more than one person’s issue, so as to obscure identity and so as not to compromise anonymity and confidentiality.
My offer to you is to answer your people issues. I will provide suggestions and advice in this Practical Counsel newsletter. And I will write an individual response to you wherever I use your problem as part of this newsletter. The advice in the newsletter will address the composite or amalgam fact pattern presented. The individual response I will write to you will address the actual facts that you have sent to me - addressing your actual problem, rather than the one I have altered in this newsletter so as to protect your anonymity and to respect your confidentiality.
Each week there will be 3 components to the newsletter. First, the fact pattern. Second, my considered response to the fact pattern. And third - a GC Insight of the Week, provided by a member of the Practical Counsel Advisory Board or a member of the Practical Counsel GC Expert Panel. The GC (or similar) expert will provide his or her own take on the problem being addressed - commenting on my suggestions and providing suggestions of his or her own. I will be introducing members of the GC Expert Panel in future issues.
Ground Rules & Undertakings
Here are my key Ground Rules & Undertakings:
I will never compromise your confidentiality.
I will always try my best to address your problem objectively and with integrity.
I will write directly and personally to anyone whose problem is used in any way in Practical Counsel - this will usually be by my taking some or most of the key facts from what you’ve sent to me and incorporating them into the problem of the week.
I will endeavour to give advice that is practical and actionable.
I will endeavour to avoid using management speak or psychobabble. I am trained as a psychologist - but I started my career as a lawyer. So I have a healthy disrespect for management speak and psychobabble. I know that lawyers value straight-talking, to-the-point, advice and counsel. (For obvious reasons I can’t assume liability for any advice or suggestions I make - but this won’t prevent me from being straight-talking).
The Practical Counsel Community
I want Practical Counsel to become more than a newsletter. I want it to become a Community within which in-house lawyers can share the people issues that are bothering them and keeping them awake at night.
You can comment actively on each issue of Practical Counsel. The Substack platform via which Practical Counsel is published makes this as easy as pie.
I would urge you to be respectful in your comments. I hope I won’t have to moderate those comments. We are all grown-up professionals and we all share the desire to be the best versions of ourselves as professionals. Or so I hope.
Spread the Word and Share
If you like what you read, please spread the word and let others know about Practical Counsel. My vision is that this will become a newsletter read by in-house lawyers across the world - and a diverse and supportive Community for its global members. Substack makes it very easy for you to share to individuals or to your networks. Please do so.
Feedback and Comments
We can only reach our full potential if people let us know what they think we should do differently or better. I welcome all constructive feedback. You can write to me directly with your feedback at jonathan@middleburghassociates.com. I will value your feedback greatly.
Next week - and Beyond
I will sent out Practical Counsel every Friday (you may get it on Saturday if your time zone is 8 or more hours ahead of London).
Next week I will be looking at an issue that I know troubles many in-house lawyers - how to bridge the Generation Gap between the established ‘older’ in-house lawyers and the younger lawyer, who has just moved in-house or is at early stage of his or her in-house career.
I look forward to your reading Practical Counsel and to your being a part of the Practical Counsel Community.