Happy Friday!

“Patently unreasonable.” That’s how a federal judge described a named partner’s $3,000 hourly rate this week, cutting it to $1,600 in a $68 million privacy settlement. 

Your rate letters won't come with a judge attached. Before you approve next year's increases:

• Benchmark like for like. A firm can be competitive on partners and expensive on associates.

• Set the terms for next time: once a year, capped, in writing with a reason.

• Know which firms are worth the premium, and write down why.

• Move the routine work. Standard agreements, policy updates and entity management rarely need an outside counsel price tag.

That last one is where flexible legal talent comes in. This two-minute walkthrough shows which work it suits, and which to keep with your firm:

— Pieter Gunst

CEO & Co-Founder, Legal.io

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PreLaw Magazine's list names 20 schools rethinking how students learn and enter the profession, from Berkeley to Purdue Global. Its take: innovation means more than adding an AI elective.

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Government affairs, public policy and corporate affairs are moving under the chief legal officer at a growing number of companies. Boards want one executive for risks that are now legal, political and reputational at once.

Law firms are feeding their secret sauce into AI

After two years buying the same tools as everyone else, big firms are building on what only they know. Morgan & Morgan says it will spend $1 billion over the next decade on the effort.

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