Boardroom and corporate

A company's board and its promoters carry legal exposure that is often addressed only after a decision has already been taken: a resolution passed without the right authority, a related-party transaction agreed without disclosure, a contract signed before its terms were reviewed. Boardroom and corporate advisory sits ahead of that point. It covers the standing legal questions a company's management and board face in the ordinary course: how a resolution should be framed and recorded, what a director's duties require in a given decision, which filings and registers a corporate structure must keep current, and how a proposed arrangement should be documented before it is entered into.

The outsourced legal model

Not every company maintains an internal legal department, and the businesses that do not still face the same volume of contracts, notices and compliance questions as those that do. The outsourced legal arrangement addresses this by putting a company's legal work on a standing retainer basis rather than requiring a matter-by-matter instruction each time a question arises. Under this arrangement, contracts and vendor documentation are reviewed as they are drafted rather than after signature, regulatory filings are tracked against their due dates, and statutory notices are responded to within the time the law allows. The model suits a company at a stage where its legal exposure has grown past what an occasional consultation can manage, but before it is large enough to justify a dedicated internal team.

What a company has to decide

The choice a growing company faces is not whether legal input is needed, but how it is structured: as an internal function it builds and staffs itself, or as a standing external arrangement that scales with the volume of work referred to it. That decision typically turns on the frequency of the legal questions the business generates, the consistency required across its contracting and governance practice, and how quickly a regulatory notice or a contractual dispute needs a response once it arrives. Boardroom advisory also extends to the governance questions that surface at moments of change (a fresh funding round, a change in shareholding, or a restructuring of the corporate group), where the documentation has to be right the first time.