Texas Ethics Opinion Strips IT Professionals of CIO, CTO Titles
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Law firms in Texas can no longer use the word “officer” or “principal” in job titles for non-lawyer employees, including chief information officer and chief technology officer, says an opinion issued by the Texas State Bar’s Professional Ethics Committee. The opinion reads that titles such as CTO indicate that the employee has the power to control “significant areas of the firm’s operations.”
The ruling has generated strong objections from five organizations that support legal professionals: the Association of Legal Administrators, the American Association of Law Libraries, the International Legal Technology Association, the International Practice Management Association, and the Legal Marketing Association. Leaders of the groups signed a June 16 letter protesting Opinion No. 642, that was sent to Mark Osborn, chairman of the bar’s Ethics Committee.
“We strongly encourage the committee to reconsider its opinion,” they wrote. “[W]e believe the opinion is overly broad and fails to provide the protections to lawyer independence and to the public interest as intended,” the letter continued. They went on to urge the committee to reconsider the opinion, “and adopt a more flexible approach. Specifically, we ask that the committee allow the use of the term ‘officer’ or ‘principal’ in titles for clearly non-lawyer and/or administrative roles.”
Read original articleTags: American Association of Law Libraries, chief information officer, chief technology officer, International Legal Technology Association, Texas State Bar's Professional Ethics Committee
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