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I debate the editor of my search firm's newsletter quite a bit over the following three words:  lawyer, attorney and counselor. For no logical reason, I'm not a big fan of the word lawyer. In my mind, I picture billboard signs and ambulance chasers. Attorney feels more corporate to me, and so I lean on that one heavily in my writing. I like the idea of counselor, but it comes across as hokey or ambiguous whenever I attempt to actually use it.

Whatever word we use to describe what you do for a living, however, here is what nonlawyer clients tend to hear: NO. At many companies, the prevailing view of the law department is still a hybrid of traffic cop and bureaucrat.

At the rank and file level, law departments are often experienced as either a “cc” on an email or a painful trip to the principal's office. Two reasons: In-house counsel do, at times, have to play a buck stops here role on what a company can and cannot do (hello, FCPA compliance). But more often, it's because the legal mindset is “No, But.”