With little 'elasticity' left in either fee rates or billable hours, law firms need to look at their expenses if they want to improve profitability, a leading partner at UK/US firm DLA Piper told a session on innovations in practice. Peter Pantaleo, head of the New York office and a member of the firm's US executive committee, said the firm has introduced outsourcing of secretarial functions in the US - to augment, rather than replace, existing secretarial resources. He said the firm had decided to maintain the lawyer/secretary relationship, as it is about 'more than just producing documents', but involving outsourcing company CBF when secretaries decided it was appropriate had allowed DLA Piper in the US to halve secretarial overtime, increase the ratio of lawyers to secretaries from 1:1.75 to 1:2.25 through natural wastage and overall save $7 million (£3.7 million) in the first year. Mr Pantaleo founded CBF before joining DLA Piper and said his involvement in the company is due to end shortly.