The largest U.S. legal operations networking group is officially opening up to firms.

The Corporate Legal Operations Consortium announced Tuesday that law firm staff who “devote the majority of their focus to legal operations or business management” can now apply to join its new Law Firm Community. Individual memberships start at $195 or $1,750 for up to 10 people from the same law firm.

CLOC board member and Gap Inc. head of legal ops Mike Haven said the new community and membership option is a response to firms “asking for a seat at the table and to be a part of the conversation in driving change in legal operations.”

Law firm members won't be able to access CLOC's in-house forums, an attempt at preventing the group from becoming a networking site for outside counsel. They'll instead access a separate CLOC site dedicated to law firm legal ops professionals.

But in-house counsel can still weigh in on firm questions, CLOC said in a press release, especially on “overlapping issues such as diversity and inclusion, billing.”

CLOC president Mary O'Carroll said in-house CLOC members can opt in to participate in the law firm community, for no added cost. In a small pilot of the CLOC law firm community more than 30 in-house professionals chose to participate, she said, with around 40 law firm members.

Since membership applications opened up publicly Monday, she said CLOC has seen “a lot of people opting in.” The group now has 170 participants, “roughly half firm and half in-house.”

“People will be curious to see what's happening at law firms and ask them questions and be part of that conversation. That's what we're trying to encourage,” said O'Carroll, who also serves as head of legal ops for Alphabet Inc.'s Google. “Because we don't want to just create this for law firms to talk to each other. The whole point is to engage across the divide.”

Legal service professionals are not eligible to join the firm community. O'Carroll said CLOC wanted to take membership option growth “one step at a time” and the divide between firms and legal departments seemed more urgent.

O'Carroll initially announced CLOC's plan to offer membership to some law firm professionals at the group's annual Las Vegas institute in May, though she did not share specifics at that time.

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