It’s a gift when an outside lawyer can hear directly from the client what they value most. Noel Elfant, Vice President and General Counsel of DeLaval, outlined the “small stuff” he expects from his outside counsel in this provocative article in law.com last week. I was doing my happy dance when I read this bullet point which hits home with what I advise my clients daily: Keep close tabs on industry news relevant to the client’s business, and share important developments on a regular basis, perhaps with a short, tailored explanation that contextualizes the information for its use. What Elfant is talking about is essentially routine services that benefit the client that doesn’t require a lot of time or specialized understanding – or other types of activities, such as getting to know the client’s business, that lawyers should do on their own time. Elfant emphasized not waiting for the client to ask….

AT&T seems to have placed a very unlikely possibility of legal jeopardy ahead of common sense and its public image – and it ended up with egg on its face and with the immediate need to walk back its initial response. According to the Los Angeles Times, Southern California resident Alfred Valrie, 35, emailed company CEO Randall Stephenson with two simple ideas to improve service and customer satisfaction: provide unlimited data for DSL users and 1,000 text messages for $10 a month. But rather than simply acknowledge the idea and act upon it (or consider it but reject it), AT&T referred the email to its legal department, where chief intellectual property counsel Thomas A. Restaino responded to Valrie as follows: “AT&T has a policy of not entertaining unsolicited offers to adopt, analyze, develop, license or purchase third-party intellectual property . . . from members of the general public. Therefore, we…