The call comes on a Saturday morning. A general counsel learns her company has been named in a mass tort complaint. The filing has already hit the wire services, and plaintiff’s counsel is holding a press conference in three hours. Reporters are asking for comment. The company’s name is trending on X. By Monday, she needs outside litigation counsel retained, a media response drafted, her board briefed, and her employees reassured. She has roughly 72 hours before the narrative hardens. What she needs at that moment is not just a litigator, but a war room. In my years working in crisis communications and litigation PR, I’ve seen law firms win major engagements because they came to the table with crisis and communications capability already in place—often through a trusted external partner who could be activated immediately to work alongside the client’s communications team. The GC wasn’t only evaluating their litigation strategy. She was asking a more urgent question: Can you help me get through Monday? The firms that can answer that question decisively are the ones being retained for these types of big-ticket cases.

The defendant’s problem is not purely legal 

Litigation departments have been slow to reckon with a simple reality: when a corporation, executive, or institution is named in high‑profile litigation, the legal exposure is rarely the most urgent problem. Brand damage and reputational fallout move faster than the docket. 

Look at the industries most frequently targeted by large‑scale litigation—pharmaceutical companies facing mass tort claims, financial institutions caught in fraud suits, consumer product manufacturers confronting class actions, technology platforms named in privacy or antitrust matters. In nearly every scenario, the filing of a complaint is a media event. 

Plaintiffs’ firms understand this. They issue press releases, hold press conferences, cultivate relationships with legal journalists, and in some cases run litigation‑funding‑backed media campaigns designed to recruit additional plaintiffs and pressure defendants toward settlement. 

By the time a GC has selected outside counsel (even from a vetted shortlist of preferred firms), the story is already being written. If the firm she retains cannot help shape it, someone else will. 

Why litigation departments resist—and why it’s costly 

When litigation departments push back on building a communications capability, it usually comes down to one of two positions. 

First: “That’s not what we do.” The firm sees itself as a legal practice, full stop. Communications is someone else’s problem — the client’s PR team, a separately retained crisis firm, or no one at all. 

Second: “Our clients have communications people.” Maybe they do. But a corporate communications director who handles earnings calls and trade press is not the same as a crisis and litigation communications specialist. And in the first 72 hours of a high‑profile lawsuit, that distinction matters enormously. 

Here’s the truth: the GC is not parsing the boundary between legal counsel and communications counsel. She is evaluating whether you can help her manage a crisis she is already in. If she has to go find someone else to fill that gap, she is already questioning whether you are the right fit. 

The type of communications counsel your clients actually need 

In fast-moving, high‑profile litigation, your client (or potential client) needs something more akin to crisis counsel than traditional communications and brand support. It’s imperative for litigation departments to showcase the ability to help a client develop and execute a strategic communications response in the acute phase of a matter. 

That means drafting holding statements and reactive media responses before litigation strategy is fully formed. It means advising on stakeholder communications—employees, investors, regulators, customers—simultaneously and without contradiction. It means monitoring coverage in real time and flagging narratives before they harden. And it means doing all of this in lockstep with the litigation team, so nothing said publicly creates legal exposure. 

For many litigation departments, the most effective model is a standing relationship with outside crisis and litigation PR professionals who understand how to operate under counsel’s direction and integrate seamlessly with the legal team. Others choose to build internal capability. The structure matters less than the readiness. 

There is also a meaningful legal advantage worth surfacing: communications professionals operating under the direction of counsel in furtherance of legal advice may be covered under attorney‑client privilege or the work‑product doctrine. That protection is not guaranteed with a separately retained PR firm hired outside counsel’s orbit. 

The retention window is your competitive moment 

The period between the filing of a lawsuit and the retention of outside counsel is one of the most consequential windows in the life of a case. It is also your greatest opportunity to differentiate. 

When a potential client is under acute pressure—fielding media inquiries, getting calls from board members, watching social media for developing narratives—the firm that picks up the phone and immediately demonstrates command of both the legal and communications landscape has a decisive advantage. It signals experience. It signals readiness. It signals that retaining you is an investment in reputation management and business continuity. 

How you respond in the first hour of a media inquiry often shapes the entire arc of coverage. The same is true of a pitch. A litigation department that walks a prospective client through a hypothetical first‑72‑hours response—legal and communications in parallel—shows the kind of integrated thinking that turns a prospect into a client. 

The firms that lose these engagements are often technically excellent. They lose because they spoke only to the lawsuit, not the broader disruption and acute risk.

Building the capability: What actually works 

Staffing is not interchangeable. The most effective models rely on specialists with deep experience in litigation‑adjacent crisis work—whether they sit inside the firm or partner with it from the outside. Former legal‑affairs journalists, communications directors who have guided institutions through regulatory investigations or class‑action exposure, PR professionals whose practices center on litigation support. Generalist backgrounds rarely match the pace, discretion, or legal sensitivity required. 

Integration is non‑negotiable. A siloed communications function provides limited value and can create real risk. Public statements need legal review. Communications strategy and litigation strategy must be developed in tandem. If your crisis communications professional—internal or external—is not in the room when case strategy is forming, you do not have an integrated capability. 

The business development case is straightforward 

Litigation departments serious about growth should treat communications as a documented capability, not an afterthought. In your next RFP response, give it its own section. In your next pitch meeting, walk the client through the first 72 hours. In your relationship‑building with GCs and CLOs, offer a crisis communications consultation on a non‑litigation matter. 

Whether the capability is internal or through a long‑standing external partner matters less than the fact that it is ready to activate. Build the relationship before the emergency call comes—and make it far more likely that you are the one who gets that call. 

The firms that get retained are the ones that see the bigger picture 

High‑profile litigation does not give defendants the luxury of a sequenced response. The legal crisis and the reputational crisis arrive at the same time. They require a response at the same time. 

When sophisticated in‑house teams evaluate outside litigation counsel, legal acumen is the threshold criterion—but increasingly, it is the table stakes. The differentiator is whether you can manage the full scope of the existential threat to a defendant’s business. 

The GC on the other end of that Saturday morning call is not choosing between law firms. She is choosing between war rooms. Make sure yours is the one she calls. 

Clayton Steward is a senior vice president for the international communications firm INFINITE. 

Reprinted with permission from the August 10, 2026 edition of the New York Law Journal © 2026 ALM Global Properties, LLC. All rights reserved. Further duplication without permission is prohibited, contact 877-256-2472 or asset-and-logo-licensing@alm.com.