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WHAT WE'RE WATCHING

HOME IS WHERE THE HEART IS - Perhaps realizing they can also have snacks and wear jeans at home, fewer law firm personnel than ever want to return to the office for more than a day or two per week, according to new data from Major, Lindsey & Africa. As Law.com's Patrick Smith reports, the legal recruiting firm conducted a follow-up flash survey to its "Lawyers' Perspectives on Returning to the Office" survey released in 2021 and found that the desire to be in the office has declined fairly significantly in less than a year. Just 27% of respondents want to be in the office three or four days a week, the survey found last month. That's down from 46% just 10 months earlier. Still, 75% of respondents said they would like to be in the office at least one day per week—they just don't see the office as a primary work destination. Stephanie Biderman, a partner in the associate practice at MLA and a co-author of the survey, said making the office experience worth the commute should be paramount in any hybrid work plan. "You have to just give both associates and partners some level of independence on what is best for them and their team," she said. "Firms have to make time in the office more valuable. Training, mentorship, positive cultural events and team-building events. That is where the focus is going to have to be." We want to hear from you on this topic. Click here to take Law.com's readers' poll on post-omicron office returns.

DOUBLE DUTY -  GCs are increasingly taking on HR chief titles as their roles expand beyond the legal department. But while these dual roles often make sense in theory, they can make for a dicey balancing act in practice. "When you finally get to that dual role, it is really hard to do both because they're both such big roles," Mira Wolff, a veteran GC and HR chief, told Law.com's Phillip Bantz. "It's a move that's not without its risks and those need to be weighed very carefully," legal department consultant Jason Winmill added. "If there happens to be a major legal crisis, and also a crisis within their new realm of responsibilities, that can be dangerous." Regardless, there are no signs that legal department leaders' workloads will be lessening any time soon. "The pandemic highlighted a GC's versatile skills and broad operational muscle to manage quickly evolving COVID requirements and impact," Jessica Nguyen, GC for Seattle-based contract and data management tech startup Lexion, told Bantz. "Now that the cat is out of the bag about a broader scope that a GC can handle well, I expect the GC workload to remain the same or grow."

WHO GOT THE WORK?℠ - UPS has retained attorney Elizabeth "Lisa" Brown of GBG LLP to fend off a pending collective employment action. The suit, filed Nov. 9 in California Northern District Court by the Iscandari Law Group and Varlack Legal Services, accuses UPS of gender and age discrimination by not promoting female workers over the age of 40. The case, assigned to U.S. District Judge Phyllis J. Hamilton, is 4:21-cv-08722, Goins et al v. United Parcel Service Inc et al. Read the complaint on Law.com Radar and check out the most recent edition of Law.com's Who Got the Work?℠ column to find out which law firms and lawyers are being brought in to handle key cases and close major deals for their clients.

FULL TILT - Apple was hit with a consumer class action Wednesday in California Northern District Court over its iPad Mini 6. The lawsuit, brought by Bursor & Fisher, contends that the liquid crystal display in the iPad Mini 6 is prone to "screen tearing," which allegedly makes texts and images appear to be tilted downward on one side. Counsel have not yet appeared for the defendant. The case is 5:22-cv-00845, Bryan v. Apple Inc. Stay up on the latest deals and litigation with the new Law.com Radar.  

EDITOR'S PICKS

WHILE YOU WERE SLEEPING

GET BACK - Here's hoping the 27% of respondents to Major Lindsey's survey who said they'd like to be back in the office three or four days a week all happen to work at Kirkland & Ellis. As Law.com International's Rose Walker reports, the global firm has announced in an internal memo that all of its attorneys and staff will be expected to return to their offices for three days each week beginning March 29. Kirkland chair Jon Ballis informed all firmwide personnel that beginning March 29, "we will move to a hybrid workplace model where attorneys and staff will be expected to be present in the office on Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday." Ballis added in the memo: "We consciously selected a date several weeks away to ensure that we would not need to delay this date any further, and to allow people to plan accordingly. In-person activities such as practice group meetings, training, social and engagement events will occur on our in-office days."

WHAT YOU SAID

"Yes, I have concerns that we might be in crisis. As norms in the nomination process are broken, as more senators, local politicians and media question the legitimacy of the court, many of them heap scorn on the court. The threat [to judicial independence] is greater and unprecedented than at any time in our history."