In-House Counsel Document Format — Multi-Track House Style

In-House Counsel Document Format — Multi-Track House Style

Author: Alessandro Dardano. Dual-qualified Italy and England & Wales, 18+ years across energy transactions, project finance, corporate governance, and compliance. Originally developed for in-house use, generalised for publication.

Version 2.3 — restructured for progressive disclosure: this SKILL.md is now a lean router, and the detailed material lives in references/ modules that are read only when relevant. The MC template is a deployer-supplied, optional asset (assets/inhouse-mc-template.docx); where it is absent, MC tracks fall back to docx-js native automatic numbering (Environment 2). v2.3 corrects the earlier text that implied the template was bundled, aligns the assets/ README accordingly, and adds a reformatting note on numbering that is itself cross-referenced (e.g., lettered article inserts). Substantive drafting content is unchanged from v2.1.

Licensed under Apache 2.0. © 2026 Alessandro Dardano. See LICENSE file for terms.

Disclaimer. This skill encodes document drafting and formatting conventions. It is not legal advice. Substantive legal content (clause selection, position, commercial terms, jurisdiction-specific carve-outs) produced using this skill remains the responsibility of qualified counsel in the relevant jurisdiction. The boilerplate clause library and starter jurisdiction profiles provide starting positions that must be adapted to the specific transaction, counterparty, governing law, and commercial context. Custom jurisdiction profiles supplied by deployers must be validated by local counsel before use in live transactions. Use of this skill does not create an attorney-client relationship.

Purpose

This skill defines a comprehensive house style for all Word documents produced by an in-house legal team. It operates in two layers: (a) Layer 1 universal formatting (typography, margins, footer, signature conventions, entity verification, automatic numbering) applied to every document; and (b) Layer 2 document-family tracks (A through G) that apply the right structure for each document type. Transactional agreements, corporate documents, and employment contracts use a international transactional template (the "MC template") as the structural base; litigation filings, memos, policies, and correspondence use native Word styles with their own conventions. Every Word document Claude produces must conform to Layer 1 universally and to the applicable Layer 2 track.

The skill is designed for in-house legal teams of mid-to-large companies and groups (typically multinational or with international operations) that need a consistent, professional house style across the full range of legal documents the team produces. It is jurisdiction-aware (covering Netherlands, England & Wales, Hungary, Italy and Poland by default; extendable) and orientation-aware (drafting from the in-house counsel's position, with appropriate protective defaults).

Terminology

Throughout this skill, the following abbreviations are used:

• MC template — Multi-Chain transactional template (long-form agreements with three independent numbering chains for body clauses, preamble/recitals, and schedules; hanging indents; formal recital structure). Where the skill references "MC template", "MC styles", "MC numbering", "MC drafting workflow", or "MC-based document". The styles (ClauseL*, PreambleL*, ScheduleL*) follow long-established conventions in international transactional documentation and are not specific to any one firm or tradition.
• The Company — the in-house team's employer entity or group. Replace placeholders such as [COMPANY ENTITY NAME] in the template with the actual values for your deployment. The MC template itself (assets/inhouse-mc-template.docx) is deployer-supplied and optional — drop in your own in-house template carrying the MC styles (ClauseL*, PreambleL*, ScheduleL*) with numbering chains numId=6 (body), numId=4 (preamble/recitals) and per-schedule chains. It is not required for the skill to function: where no template is present, the MC tracks fall back to docx-js native multi-level numbering (Environment 2 in references/workflow.md), which produces equivalent automatic numbering. Provide the template only to use Environment 1's full named-style styleset, or ask Claude to generate a verified generic MC template.
• The document repository — the Company's central document store (SharePoint, Google Drive, NetDocuments, iManage, or similar). Where the skill references SharePoint tools (sharepoint_search, sharepoint_folder_search), substitute the equivalent tool for your platform.

Jurisdiction Architecture

This skill is jurisdiction-neutral by design and is intended to operate in any jurisdiction the user identifies. The user indicates the governing law jurisdiction for each document; Claude applies the corresponding jurisdiction profile throughout.

How it works

1. At the start of every drafting task (or whenever a jurisdiction-dependent decision arises), Claude identifies the applicable jurisdiction:

   • From explicit user instruction ("draft a Dutch law SPA", "this is governed by English law")
   • From context (counterparty location, project location, Company entity involved, prior conversation)
   • By asking the user if jurisdiction is unclear and material to the drafting

2. Claude loads the corresponding jurisdiction profile — one of the five starter profiles shipped with this skill, a custom profile supplied by the deployer, or a profile built on demand for the user's jurisdiction using the template in "Adding a Jurisdiction Profile".

3. Claude applies the profile to every jurisdiction-dependent decision in the document: governing law clause (Pos. 22), payments/interest mechanism (Pos. 7), good faith treatment (Pos. 10), civil code remedies waiver (Pos. 14), third-party rights exclusion (Pos. 17), construction rules addendum (Pos. 1.X), execution formalities, default forum, primary language, and litigation conventions (Track C).

Starter jurisdiction profiles (worked examples)