The Association of Corporate Counsel (ACCC) has released a survey on the evolving role of the chief legal officer (CLO) and how legal departments help organizations most effectively adapt to the broader business environment.
The “2024 ACC Chief Legal Officers Survey” is based on responses from 669 CLOs from organizations spanning 20 industries and 31 countries. The results show that CLOs and legal departments face intense pressure to do more with less. Forty-two percent of departments received a mandate to cut legal costs, and 58 percent experienced major rate hikes by their law firms. The results also show a decrease in the percentage of departments that will add staff in 2024.
The top three issues that keep CLOs up at night are regulation and enforcement (53 percent), privacy and data security (41 percent), and cybersecurity threats (37 percent). The survey further revealed that data breaches are the biggest data-related threat CLOs want to mitigate in 2024, with 40 percent saying they plan on instituting new processes to help defend against these threats. However, just 9 percent are “very confident” in their organization’s ability to mitigate emerging data risks.
CLOs rank operational efficiency as their top strategic initiative for the coming year, with 45 percent planning to invest in new technology to enhance their department's efficiency. Sixty-three percent of CLOs said they seek to develop greater business acumen among the lawyers in their department, followed by communication skills (51 percent) and executive presence (45 percent).
The majority of CLOs oversee at least three additional business functions beyond legal. These most commonly include areas such as privacy (44 percent), ethics (43 percent), and risk (38 percent). The survey also revealed that 59 percent of CLOs say their workload increased over the last year. Still, only 20 percent of those who experienced a significant increase in workload say they are happy.
Check these 10 Key Findings from the 2024 CLO Survey to learn more about the results.