Aetna GC Says Less is More in Legal Memos

Few things seem to bother corporate counsel more than the unrestrained long form memo from their outside law firm.

Thomas Sabatino, newly-hired GC at health insurance provider Aetna, explained: “Don’t write me a 20-page memo on something because you had some associate research a particular issue that I’ve asked about,” he said. “A 20-page memo doesn’t help me at all.”

Apparently emails are also a problem: “I can’t tell you how many times I get communications where I asked a question, and I get a long, two-page email, where I actually at the end of it don’t even know what the advice was,” he ...