GCs are increasingly providing organisations with strategic as well as legal advice and this is a major factor in repositioning in-house legal departments at the centre of the business.

The shift from simply providing legal advice to a complex role that encompasses strategy and leadership has been driven by a combination of economic factors and budgetary considerations as well as broader choice and increased competition in legal services provision.

In many corporations, the GC is leading and managing what is effectively a business within a business, deciding which tasks to retain in-house and which to allocate to external counsel or alternative legal service providers. The GC role is further complicated by globalisation, which exposes businesses to multiple regulatory regimes, and by the speed and frequency of regulatory change.

Although the majority of in-house legal teams comprise between two and ten lawyers, many GCs are in effect sole practitioners, advising on matters ranging from routine contracts and transactions to business critical strategic decisions and crisis management and are recognised as 'more than lawyers'.

For the first time in three years, The Lawyer 'In-House Attitudes Report' 2014 found that changing economic conditions were not in-house counsels' primary challenge. This indicates a new optimism in the light of economic recovery.

However, the growing regulatory burden has increased the legal workload and budgetary restrictions and static staffing levels have maintained internal pressure on the legal function. For many companies, legal spend represents a substantial budget item, which can increase dramatically if the company is involved in M&A and/or litigation.

One popular way of controlling legal spend is to retain more work in-house and reduce reliance on external counsel, whose costs can be relatively high and unpredictable thanks to law firms' pricing model, which is generally based on the billable hour.

However, businesses requiring specialist expertise still need to instruct external firms and the right technology can play a significant role in helping GCs manage their legal spend and improve internal processes and productivity.

Tom Brown, head of legal for UK and Ireland at PayPal, who heads a seven-strong legal team, says: "We retain the majority of our work in-house and we use external counsel for intricate instructions or when we require country expertise. We have a very tight panel of firms that I trust to do a good job."

Some law firms offer their clients collaboration software. While corporates tend to invest in sophisticated IT architecture that is superior to that of most law firms they instruct, many GCs acknowledge that law firms have excellent legal research and know-how resources.

Corporate legal departments are increasingly deploying software that enables them to track the progress of the work they undertake in-house as well as that outsourced to external firms and to monitor billing against budgets. The resulting management information – which includes, but is not confined to billing data – is used to guide decision making, improve processes and manage and control legal expenditure.

The GC role has evolved as the legal function has shifted to the heart of the business. Brown is a member of PayPal's regional management team. He describes the GC role as the conscience of the business. "Everyone comes to the GC for legal advice and approval, so we are aware of what is going on across the entire business, which is why lawyers often make good COOs and CEOs", he adds.

PayPal's legal function relies on software to manage documents and billing. The expanded GC role has led to lawyers becoming more business-like.

As Rob Thomas, a former lawyer and co-founder of Serengeti Tracker, a legal solution from Thomson Reuters, observes: "The language of business is accounting and numbers. Technology solutions help in-house lawyers understand company financials and keep track of spending."

Serengeti data can be used to create management reports, for example to analyse spending on particular types of matter. It is about enhancing visibility across the business. Typically, a system like Serengeti will cost around 1% of spending; and savings in the first year are expected to be over 10%.

The Lawyer 'In-House Attitudes Report' reflects that the broader role of the GC, which carries responsibilities beyond the legal implications of business decisions, is most obvious in the drive for efficiency, value and commercial awareness that is shaping the relationship between corporate legal departments and their external advisers.

Looking ahead, company directors and GCs generally expect GCs' strategic input into business decisions to increase over the next five to ten years. The drive for efficiency and value when it comes to legal spend and the complex regulatory considerations that are bringing GCs' responsibility closer to corporate boards highlight the importance of transparency in corporate governance and decision making.

Investing in the right technology is not just about managing the pressure on prices and processes; it also supports the GC's critical role in managing corporate risk and strategic decisions.

For more information about Serengeti Tracker please visit serengetilaw.com/international/uk