Orrick, Herrington & Sutcliff's Global Operations Center in Wheeling just celebrated its tenth anniversary.
Baxter
Turani
WHEELING – Orrick, Herrington & Sutcliffe's Global Operations Center, which is the first of its kind, recently celebrated its 10th anniversary.
Orrick's GOC was founded with the intent of in-sourcing the firm's information technology infrastructure and financial operations and has become the core of virtually all of the firm's day-to-day administrative operations and is increasingly becoming integrated into its client service offerings through career associates, document review service, discovery technology team and Global Corporate Solutions compliance services.
Will Turani, the Director of Operations in Wheeling, said the GOC started with just 73 employees in 2002 and has grown to having approximately 350 full- and part-time employees now.
"Orrick's Global Operations Center is the first of its kind and the only global operations center for Orrick," Turani said. "We started with our core functions and have grown over the past 10 years."
Turani said Orrick does not practice law in West Virginia, but the GOC provides legal services for Orrick's law offices across the globe.
Wheeling was chosen as the home for Orrick's GOC after the company did an international search that narrowed down to four locations, one of which was Wheeling.
"Ultimately, it came down to Wheeling having a large pool of talent for what we were going to do," Turani said. "It's been a tremendous success for the firm and it's been great for the Wheeling area."
Ralph Baxter, Orrick's Chairman and CEO said being the first U.S.-based law firm to in-source its back office operations was one of the smarted decisions Orrick ever made for the firm and for its clients.
"I believe that we have far-surpassed our goal of simply improving client service and reducing operating costs," Baxter said. "We've greatly improved our client-focused services, including our e-discovery, document review and compliance services, middle-office support and administrative functions, providing Orrick with a strategic, competitive differentiator among our peer law firms."
Adi Weisman, communications manager for Orrick, said the GOC is home to Orrick's network operations center, internationally recognized service desk, software applications support and web engineering.
The GOC also houses Orrick's finance services, which include global taxation, general ledger, billing and collections and payroll.
Turani said when you call for the service desk, marketing, or many other types of services at Orrick, you will be speaking with someone in Wheeling.
The GOC provides Orrick and its clients with a central business infrastructure that delivers support services around the world and around the clock.
Turani said the GOC has also expanded into new growth with its career associates positions.
"With the career associates, we provide services for Orrick's law firms around the globe," Turani said.
Orrick currently employs more than 40 career associates in the GOC, who work across a variety of practice areas including commercial litigation, mergers and acquisitions, private equity, public finance, intellectual property, e-discovery and information management, emerging companies, insurance and employment law.
The GOC is home to the firm's network operations center, the electronically accessed service desk, software applications support and e-mail administration.