Price Waterhouse Coopers LLP: An Overview of In-House Counsel and Duties - Essay Example

Price Waterhouse Coopers LLP: An Overview of In-House Counsel and Duties Though traditionally associated with tax and audit matters, the business expertise and services offered by traditional accounting firms have changed dramatically over the past few decades. As the nature of the services provided continues to evolve, so too does the nature of the workforce needed to offer these services in a cost-effective and professional manner. This essay will concentrate on the composition and the duties of a major accounting firm, Price Waterhouse Coppers LLP.

More specifically, this essay will identify house many lawyers are employed in-house, how these in-house lawyers are typically classified, and how the legal divisions are organized. As an initial matter, it is useful to understand how in-house lawyers are classified. These lawyers have a single client, Price Waterhouse, and they are organized in an hierarchal fashion. The General Counsel is the top in-house attorney, the Associate General Counsel are the lawyers responsible for managing the different legal divisions, and the Corporate Counsel are lawyers whom work in the separate legal divisions.

These lawyers decide which legal issues shall be handled in-house by the corporation and which legal issues shall be allocated to outside law firms. Price Waterhouse has several employees with qualifications in both the law and accounting; however, their formal in-house counsel team consists of fifty seven lawyers in the United States and abroad. These lawyers work in a variety of legal divisions. The legal work at Price Waterhouse Coopers is divided into several divisions with related sub-divisions.

Business transactions, for instance, is a legal division with deals with the lifecycle of various business organizations. These in-house lawyers deal with corporate formations, mergers and acquisitions, divestment, valuation issues, and corporate finance issues. There is also a tax division which addresses a wide variety of American and international tax issues. This ranges from basic corporate income tax to executive and employee compensation plans to estate planning structures to providing advice on the taxation of international transactions.

In addition to planning issues, these lawyers also deal with regulatory issues and compliance requirements. Increasingly, and Price Waterhouse is no exception, lawyers have been hired to handle technology and intellectual property issues. These lawyers address taxation issues involving intellectual property and protection and compliance issues. Finally, while there are not separate legal divisions as such, Price Waterhouse does have specific lawyers assigned to handle human resource issues and ethics as well.

In conclusion, Price Waterhouse demonstrates how traditional accounting firms have expanded both in terms of services offered and in terms of the nature of employees sought and hired. An analysis of in-house counsel is particularly illuminating. One might imagine that legal divisions will continue to develop and become more specialized as accounting firms expand the services offered.