In this time of the COVID-19 coronavirus, the role of outside counsel has never been more important. The outside attorney is in a unique position to team with his clients to develop solutions to problems like those created by the coronavirus epidemic.
First, outside counsel is more connected, particularly in these times, than people at a client. The attorney is in contact with multiple clients and contacts, who are often competitors and peers of the client. While the lawyer cannot breach client confidentiality, she can share, at a high level and on a no-names basis, what she is seeing in the market and how other firms are dealing with similar issues. Clients and even non-clients feel more comfortable that an attorney will keep their matters confidential. In contrast, while a business person could contact someone at a peer firm, there often is not the same level of trust that the peer will not disclose that information to someone else (e.g., an investor considering two fund sponsors). In this way, outside counsel can serve as a valuable intermediary in the market. As the attorney sees similarly situated clients dealing with issues in a particular environment, such as COVID-19, he is able to reach out proactively to his other clients to ask if they are also considering these issues.
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