[ryanroberts]

If you want to work with startups, you would have either do corporate/securities or IP work. Very difficult to do both, as each is a deep & separate field of law. Thus, it's unlikely that one lawyer could handle all a startup's legal needs (and thus be 'general counsel').

Of course, there is the capital resources issue of having a lawyer full-time. Even if the startup is funded, I doubt the investor(s) would be happy cash (or even the startup's equity) is going towards a full-time lawyer instead of marketing or product dev.

[skmurphy]

General Counsel (GC) normally has different focus than handling all of a firm's legal needs. There are a number of fields of law that a growing startup may be impacted by including contracts, employment, securities, patent, and litigation, to name a few. For a company above a certain size having a lawyer on staff to manage outside legal specialists will quickly pay for itself (you might be surprised what outside legal fees can run).

The primary challenge is to explain to the executive staff the business impact of various legal strategies (and their attendant risks) and to help reach a working consensus on the right balance between particular legal risks and other business risks and opportunities. The GC's are typically senior associates who traded the last few years on the partner track for a reasonable salary and a life.