Dominance in the Details
May 26, 2005
Ed Wesemann's book Creating Dominance provides an impressively coherent guide to strategic thinking for law firm planners. The book draws on Wesemann's…
New York Loses Bid to Tax CT Telecommuter
May 26, 2005
In a rare victory for a telecommuter in a "convenience of the employer" rule case, an administrative law judge has held against the state Division of Taxation and said New York has no business taxing all of the income of a man who worked from his home in New Canaan, CT.
Friend or Foe?
May 26, 2005
Recent months have delivered to employers what could be seen as a nasty one-two punch. First, the Office of Federal Contract Compliance Programs (OFCCP) announced that it planned to focus its resources on "rooting out" systemic discrimination -- and unveiled proposed guidelines completely altering the way it will analyze potential compensation discrimination. The new guidelines, which require employers of a certain size to use a statistical tool called multiple regression analysis, will be enforced by a team of statisticians the OFCCP has newly hired to create the ominous-sounding Division of Statistical Analysis. Second, the recent Supreme Court decision allowing disparate impact claims in age cases could be interpreted as giving the green light to additional age-bias lawsuits by removing the hurdle of proving or even alleging intent. However, these changes will not necessarily have an adverse impact on employers, and may actually be helpful.
A Roundtable Discussion on Leading Compliance Issues in the U.S. and EU
May 26, 2005
Throughout the world, Sarbanes-Oxley (SOX) legislation might well have had the biggest impact in corporate governance since the introduction of limited liability. To that end, jurisdictions outside the U.S. have not been idle. A recent Eversheds survey found more than 100 studies on the topic in 29 European countries within and outside the EU. Clearly, proper compliance to corporate governance guidelines is top of the list to in-house counsel across the EU, as well as the U.S. This roundtable sought to road-test some of these issues and look to some of the U.S.'s best governed corporations to see if there is a map for the journey ahead.
'Information Security 101'
May 25, 2005
Recent headlines have reported a startling number of security breaches and information thefts. A major university notified 120,000 of its alumni after a computer containing fundraising information including addresses and Social Security numbers was hacked by an unknown intruder; a subsidiary of the Lexis Nexis group announced that the records of 32,000 individuals may have fallen into the hands of thieves using the passwords of legitimate subscribers; Bank of America reported the loss of backup tapes containing the financial records of up to 1.2 million federal employees; payroll outsourcer PayMaxx faced allegations that it had exposed 25,000 customer records, including W-2 information, online; and cell phone provider T-Mobile released information about a hacker who was able to exploit a security weakness in a commercial software package to access customer records, sensitive government documents, private e-mail and candid celebrity photos.
Big Investment Banks Win Big in Congress
May 24, 2005
The major investment banks secured a big win with the Bankruptcy Abuse Prevention & Consumer Protection Act of 2005 (the Act). They quietly convinced Congress to remove the strongest limitation in the Bankruptcy Code (' 101(14)) on a Chapter 11 debtor's employment of an investment banker. That prohibition, in effect since the Depression, had essentially prevented the debtor's retention of a banker for any of the debtor's outstanding securities The securities industry called the statutory ban "anti-competitive."
Special Issue: A Roundtable Discussion on Leading Compliance Issues in the U.S. and EU
May 09, 2005
Throughout the world, Sarbanes-Oxley (SOX) legislation might well have had the biggest impact in corporate governance since the introduction of limited liability. To that end, jurisdictions outside the U.S. have not been idle. A recent Eversheds survey found more than 100 studies on the topic in 29 European countries within and outside the EU. Clearly, proper compliance to corporate governance guidelines is top of the list to in-house counsel across the EU, as well as the U.S. To avoid civil and criminal penalties, multinational companies have to comply with laws and principles of good governance in all of the countries where they operate. U.S. legislation attempts extra-territorial reach. That legislation is in most cases in addition to, rather than in substitution for, local law, even for NYSE-listed entities. For multinationals, then, even if SOX is the beginning of the story, it is not the end. This roundtable sought to road-test some of these issues and look to some of the U.S.'s best governed corporations to see if there is a map for the journey ahead.
Lawyers Beware
May 02, 2005
In the first 3 months of 2005, the SEC filed 18 cases against lawyers. More are clearly coming. Just last month, SEC Chairman William Donaldson warned that the SEC is "firmly committed to both the rules governing attorney conduct, and to the principles that underlie them, and we will enforce them when violated." As if Donaldson's message were too oblique, the SEC's chief litigation counsel put it bluntly: the SEC "has made cases against lawyers a priority."
Time to Replace Your Accounting Software?
April 29, 2005
Changes in business strategies, rising client demands, and technology advances all have made a law firm's choice of accounting software an ever more important management decision. Five years ago the Y2K scare led many firms to upgrade or replace their accounting systems out of perceived tactical necessity. Now, however, an assessment of your accounting software should be strategic: how well does it support your overall business objectives?
