Is the job title “general counsel” outdated? Quite a few in-house authorized crew leaders appear to assume it now not displays the wide-ranging nature of their roles. Others stand by the identify, although — defending it as a approach to differentiate their position as a protector and an moral voice inside the enterprise.
But, regardless of the title, the position for all of them entails each defending their organisations and taking the rising alternatives to contribute on enterprise technique.
Over the previous month, the Business Legal Leaders collection has been scrutinising the evolving position of those authorized professionals and listening to their views on the trendy authorized crew.
Now, the FT’s Innovative Lawyers analysis companion, RSGI, has chosen 20 in-house authorized leaders who’ve performed an excellent position in serving to their organisations cope with enterprise challenges. These can vary from the altering regulatory setting to the broader calls for of stakeholder capitalism.
Our authorized leaders’ obligations have included overhauling outdated corporations, nurturing younger start-ups, and coping with disruption in provide chains and from rivals. Several of the attorneys have taken a lead on range and inclusion — not simply in their very own departments however of their corporations, and their industries, as a complete.
Mary Ormerod, content material director, RSGI
Profiles compiled by RSGI and FT editors; listed by firm identify in alphabetical order.
Gabriel Harnier
group normal counsel, BAYER
Three years in the past, below Harnier’s management, the authorized crew at Bayer, the German prescription drugs and life sciences firm, moved its contracting, information privateness and compliance actions to a shared companies centre.
Harnier wished to streamline the enterprise’s contracting processes and challenged the authorized crew to give you the best contract potential. Using document-generation software program, the shared companies centre now delivers 50 completely different contract varieties with minimal human enter.
With this new method, the procurement crew, which executes about 10,000 agreements a 12 months, has considerably lowered its workload. Thanks to the totally digital contracting course of, the authorized crew can monitor obligations routinely and extract new insights from the info.
Hon Ng
General counsel, Binance
in a earlier position at ride-hailing app Uber, Hon Ng found that the challenges a normal counsel faces in a disruptive trade are sometimes not authorized issues, as such. And this has proved very true in his present position at cryptocurrency alternate Binance. The greatest problem, in line with Ng, is that the tradition of the trade is inherently targeted on decentralisation.
He has spent the previous two years serving to to determine Binance as a mainstream model, constructing a company construction and stabilising its status by means of safeguarding measures, similar to a complete “know your customer” course of that checks proof of deal with and sources of wealth.
Since becoming a member of the corporate in 2020, Ng has expanded the authorized crew from 4 to greater than 80 staff. His precedence has been hiring the appropriate individuals, significantly these with expertise working for regulators or governments. Ng is greater than a standard in-house danger adviser and, likewise, he expects his crew to be industrial leaders, participating with exterior stakeholders and serving to the enterprise develop.
Jan Gustavsson
General counsel, Coca-Cola hbc
In a survey this 12 months to measure inner buyer satisfaction in numerous enterprise areas, the authorized crew scored highest out of all departments. Jan Gustavsson places this right down to the division’s crew spirit and entrepreneurial tradition.
Now, his precedence is individuals improvement. He has linked the authorized division with its friends in different Coca-Cola corporations by means of “cross-company practice groups”, through which the attorneys share concepts on key subjects. This has been a helpful coaching software and enabled individuals from his crew to maneuver into extra senior roles within the wider firm.
In his 22 years as normal counsel, Gustavsson has broadened the authorized perform’s remit to incorporate enterprise danger administration, safety, and company improvement. He has additionally pushed digital modifications within the authorized crew, together with the event of contract administration software program.
John Kim
General counsel, Cognizant
John Kim’s message to aspiring in-house authorized leaders is that success depends upon “soft skills” — significantly a capability to construct consensus throughout disparate teams. At Cognizant, the know-how and enterprise companies firm, he says the tradition is entrepreneurial by nature and requires this method reasonably than top-down decision-making.
Kim can be an advocate for range and inclusion initiatives each throughout the enterprise — which has almost 350,000 staff — and in his personal crew. He views mentorship as the most effective software to drive change on this space.
To handle the day-to-day workload, Cognizant makes use of contracting software program which helps make drafting and matter administration extra environment friendly, and Kim’s ambition is for robotics and synthetic intelligence to deal with extra of this course of within the subsequent few years. He has additionally overseen the expansion of the offshore authorized crew, increasing its footprint globally in order that issues might be dealt with extra rapidly by attorneys working throughout completely different time zones.
Alison Zoellner
Global normal counsel, Dentsu International
Alison Zoellner has direct expertise of transformation, having began as an in-house lawyer on the New York Times Company simply because the web upturned the media. Now at Dentsu, the promoting group, Zoellner and her crew must sustain with an trade that strikes forward at pace. For instance, buyer expertise administration entails new challenges, similar to information privateness regulation.
And digital promoting is such a crowded market that the stress to ship worth for cash is relentless. She encourages her crew to be taught new abilities, noting how she has been helped by the overlap between crypto legislation, wanted within the metaverse, and derivatives legislation, which she learnt throughout a spell at Honeywell, the US conglomerate.
Zoellner is most conscious of the shopper expertise, making certain that her crew understands the real-world dangers in contract talks and the necessity to keep away from delays. She goals to enhance the consumer expertise and is implementing digital instruments, similar to contract assessment, utilizing synthetic intelligence.
Jonathan Leiken
Chief authorized officer, Diebold Nixdorf
Jonathan Leiken says predictions of the demise of the ATM money machines that his firm manufactures are exaggerated. Despite the patron shift to digital funds, demand for money has remained regular. The larger risk to the enterprise, he says, is the reliability of the availability chain for pc chips, which is a principal focus for his crew.
Diebold Nixdorf has additionally moved into producing self-service checkouts for outlets, in addition to software program for car charging stations. This can current advanced authorized challenges, from understanding possession of the {hardware} to determining how buyer information is processed. Within the authorized division, he has launched synthetic intelligence for contract assessment and expanded versatile working.
In addition, Leiken teaches a category on “the role of the modern GC” at Ohio State University legislation faculty. His message is that this “has expanded to be the company’s teacher and problem solver”. He is chargeable for ESG insurance policies at Diebold Nixdorf, as nicely. Having spent his early profession working as a public prosecutor, Leiken sees a direct line between public service and a part of his present position — which is exhibiting the group’s staff and traders that it’s a accountable company citizen. As an instance, he cites the corporate’s determination to sentence publicly the January 6 assault on the US Capitol in 2021.
Maaike de Bie
Group normal counsel, easyJet
Maaike De Bie’s first 12 months as normal counsel at airline easyJet required a cool head amid mounting existential crises: an enormous cyber safety breach; battle with Stelios Haji-Ioannou, the corporate founder turned activist shareholder; organising a separate airline for intra-European flights post-Brexit; stringent journey bans and different results of the pandemic; and managing advanced new legal guidelines and laws.
Outside the corporate, she additionally labored with the remainder of the journey trade to barter new guidelines with governments, and raised funds to maintain the airline afloat. Internally, she was negotiating with shareholders and unions to boost further capital and reduce prices.
Amid the turmoil, de Bie has stored a watch on the longer term. She established a values assertion for the authorized crew, based mostly on the precept that workers needs to be judged not simply by what they ship but additionally how they ship it — for instance, speaking inside normal working hours. De Bie has reviewed how the division works with exterior advisers, too, to create a “legal community” of legislation corporations to collaborate together with her crew and one another.
De Bie is concerned within the airline’s sustainability programme, as nicely, which entails carbon offsetting funding and exploring various fuels, similar to hydrogen, for short-haul flights. De Bie has been appointed to take up the put up of group normal counsel for the telecoms agency Vodafone in March 2023.
Joanne Caruso
Chief authorized and administrative officer, Jacobs
Since becoming a member of the authorized crew at Jacobs 10 years in the past, having beforehand been a litigation lawyer, Joanne Caruso has labored throughout varied enterprise areas. For instance, she moved from authorized to run human sources in 2017 earlier than taking over a newly created chief administrative officer position in 2018. Legal obligations have been added again in a 12 months later.
The remit is broad: Caruso additionally has duty for enterprise danger administration, ethics and compliance, operational centres of excellence, well being and security, and the safety and equality departments. Until not too long ago, she managed the corporate’s sustainability agenda and now continues as its government sponsor.
One of her greatest impacts within the organisation, says chief government Steve Demetriou, has been in serving to to remodel the tradition of the worldwide skilled companies firm, which is unfold throughout 400 workplaces, and contributing strategic insights.
Alan Tse
Chief authorized officer, Jones Lang LaSalle
Alan Tse says the principle objective of a prime in-house lawyer is to guard the corporate’s status. He has a nuanced understanding of the position, having served in the same capability at 5 earlier corporations, together with start-ups, earlier than becoming a member of Jones Lang LaSalle 4 years in the past.
Tse’s remit at the true property administration firm consists of compliance and ethics, danger administration, and enterprise continuity planning.
He has targeted on breaking down silos each in his crew and within the wider enterprise — for instance, by encouraging his crew to be extra proactive about danger administration and to assist colleagues embrace compliance. The authorized crew can be closely concerned within the reporting and governance elements of the corporate’s sustainability agenda and was instrumental in implementing its sanctions coverage.
Rob Mobassaly
General counsel, Juniper Networks
Beyond day-to-day authorized work for IT community firm Juniper, Rob Mobassaly’s crew is busy serving to the enterprise with authorities affairs, sustainability points, and social justice issues. In his view, authorized is uniquely nicely positioned to supervise these company-wide efforts from its central level: facilitating collaboration, designing concrete deliverables, and making certain accountability. His crew, for instance, helped the corporate design its plan for attaining carbon neutrality targets it set out final 12 months.
Mobassaly inherited a complete automation programme within the division, with authorized technologists serving to to make contracting and authorized assist companies extra environment friendly. Now, he needs to make use of information to go additional. His crew is working with the mental property division to analyse patent information and uncover which demographics have been inventing the latest merchandise. The goal is to find methods through which the corporate can deal with its gender imbalance in engineering.
In normal, Mobassaly’s precedence as a pacesetter is to enhance the expertise of working in authorized. He says he favours a scientific method: writing an issue assertion, creating hypotheses, then experimenting. This helps attorneys each to assume extra creatively and to work with scientific colleagues.
Pierre Gentin
Global normal counsel, McKinsey & Company
Pierre Gentin’s purpose is to develop a excessive–performing authorized crew that matches the calibre of McKinsey’s exterior model, although the crew’s work is generally internally dealing with. To obtain this, he has helped the crew take possession of its core aims: offering a proactive and responsive service; defending the agency; and having a strategic partnership with the enterprise.
He believes that the best way to construct a dynamic authorized perform is to assist individuals transcend skilled excellence and have them carry the fervour and vitality from their private lives into work. He encourages them to share their very own pursuits, like music or working, as a manner of constructing neighborhood within the office
When Gentin joined the corporate, he restructured the authorized crew to make it extra nimble and multidisciplinary. The crew has piloted automation instruments for core authorized documentation and carried out “agile” organisational concepts, which helps to handle enterprise requests in numerous areas of experience.
Caroline Pontoppidan
General counsel and head of company affairs, Maersk
In Pontoppidan’s six years as group normal counsel at Maersk, the worldwide logistics firm has needed to cope with the challenges of the Covid-19 pandemic and Russia’s warfare in Ukraine. And when provide chains suffered interruptions in consequence, Maersk’s authorized crew was wanted to resolve issues.
Pontoppidan additionally retains a watch on the longer term. She manages relations with governments, each as head of public affairs and by overseeing compliance. Besides addressing the authorized questions, Pontoppidan additionally works with governments on the resilience of provide chains.
The firm plans an acquisition in China that can imply intently watching US-China relations and forthcoming regulation in Beijing. Last 12 months, Pontoppidan labored on Maersk’s order for eight carbon-neutral ships.
Ann Miller
General counsel, Nike
In addition to main the authorized crew at Nike, Ann Miller is chargeable for authorities affairs, social and neighborhood affect, and the resiliency crew, which addresses enterprise continuity.
Miller encourages the attorneys to be proactive and has outlined the authorized crew’s objective as “to power and protect Nike’s competitive advantage”. The firm’s method to product design is an instance of this, because the authorized crew works intently with product designers — generally years earlier than there’s a prototype — to make sure that mental property is captured and leveraged to its full potential.
To unencumber time for the attorneys to concentrate on these excessive worth duties, Miller has invested in contract administration. Through a mixture of know-how, course of and outsourcing, a crew of 4 attorneys within the know-how division can handle a number of thousand contracts per 12 months.
David Flavell
Chief authorized officer, PepsiCo
David Flavell’s goal when embarking on an in-house authorized profession was to work in quite a lot of abroad locations. So far, his work has taken him to Australia, New Zealand, Shanghai and Dubai, and he’s now based mostly in New York, the place he joined PepsiCo final 12 months.
Flavell leads a world crew of almost 400 on the meals and beverage firm, the place he’s chargeable for authorized, compliance and ethics and likewise works intently with the board and audit committee. Trained in mergers and acquisitions, he has been instrumental in a lot of PepsiCo’s key transactions, such because the latest sale of a majority stake in its Tropicana and Naked Juice manufacturers and the $3.2bn deal to purchase carbonated drinks firm SodaStream in 2018.
The authorized perform has additionally been closely concerned within the sustainability agenda at PepsiCo, from supporting the enterprise in its transfer to recyclable plastic to its announcement of an bold purpose to regenerate farming practices throughout its agricultural footprint by 2030. Flavell is moreover pushing the digital transformation of the authorized perform and has appointed a brand new authorized operations head.
Dan Gallagher
Chief authorized officer, Robinhood
Dan Gallagher goals to maintain the authorized crew “lean and mean” at Robinhood, the no-fee on-line brokerage that he joined in 2020. He believes {that a} disruptive fintech requires a small group of attorneys who know their topic inside out. He attracts the most effective expertise by encouraging distant and hybrid working. He has additionally thinned out Robinhood’s panel legislation corporations and inspired these nonetheless on the books to speak on to firm executives.
Gallagher served as a commissioner on the US Securities and Exchange Commission for 4 years to 2015. That expertise gave him a pointy understanding of the regulatory points that face Robinhood. It additionally taught him the best way to keep calm in a disaster and led to an appreciation of Robinhood’s goal to widen entry to monetary markets. Purpose-led decision-making is useful for his job, Gallagher says.
From the GameStop disaster of January 2021, when Robinhood curbed entry to buying and selling within the firm’s shares, to Robinhood’s preliminary public providing seven months later, he has discovered {that a} clear mission makes quick selections simpler. His time in authorities additionally taught him the best way to deal with exterior affairs and communications, which he oversees at Robinhood.
Todd Machtmes
Executive vice-president and normal counsel, Salesforce
The normal counsel of cloud-based software program firm Salesforce prioritises values of belief and buyer focus within the authorized crew. When Todd Machtmes joined the corporate in 2005, there was no mannequin for the best way to construct a authorized division for a software-as-a-service enterprise, he remembers. So the authorized crew was typically guided by the corporate values in its decision-making, which has led to outcomes similar to clearer phrases a few buyer’s rights in a contract.
Today, the crew is commonly referred to as on to advise on innovative points similar to information switch legal guidelines, that are of essential significance to a enterprise similar to Salesforce. Lawyers in his crew are working to affect future privateness laws in Europe and the remainder of the world, similar to a proposed new model of the “privacy shield” that may permit cross-data transfers between Europe and the US.
Data privateness experience is in excessive demand, and Machtmes says Salesforce’s status as an revolutionary and values-based firm has been necessary in attracting and retaining expertise.
Peter Wexler
General counsel, Schneider Electric
As incoming GC in 2009, Peter Wexler and his crew created an ethics constitution for Schneider Electric, the French electrical gear group. Generally perceived then as “‘nice to have”, the charter enabled the firm to remain ahead of the curve as environmental, social and governance (ESG) principles became more widely embraced. The ethics charter now forms part of Schneider’s important coaching for all workers and Wexler credit it as one of many foundations of its award-winning ESG insurance policies.
More not too long ago, Wexler navigated the moral quagmire of securing the enterprise’s departure from Russia by promoting its Russian pursuits to native administration.
This 12 months, the corporate is rolling out most of the options Wexler’s crew has been collaborating on with the digital crew, together with a contract lifecycle administration software and a software to streamline export controls compliance. Wexler says that larger use of tech bolsters its moral stance, as a result of “technology fosters transparency, and transparency builds trust”.
Stephanie Burns
General counsel, Sony Interactive Entertainment (PlayStation)
Stephanie Burns joined PlayStation, Sony’s gaming division, from Amazon having beforehand labored for ticket reseller StubHub and two start-ups. These roles have taught her that specializing in buyer expertise may help authorized groups to realize higher outcomes.
Burns encourages her crew to pattern PlayStation video games. She says that understanding the authorized implications of the know-how is necessary, particularly as Sony strikes into digital actuality and the metaverse. Burns additionally works on the corporate’s authorities relations, speaking to politicians about mental property, privateness and on-line security.
She is a board member for ChIPS, an organisation that helps ladies in tech, legislation and coverage, and is government sponsor for an worker group, [email protected], which promotes accessibility.
Amy Tu
Chief authorized officer, world governance and company affairs, Tyson meals
Amy Tu’s position at US meat provider is concentrated on creating a strategic method to danger that works for your complete enterprise. This has concerned taking over a broad remit in areas from well being and security to the setting and aviation.
Tu says that shut integration of the operations and authorized groups is significant in a long-term danger technique: “[Risk management] is an ongoing, living discussion,” she explains. Tu, who has been at Tyson since 2017, is an entrepreneurial thinker, and helped to discovered Tyson Ventures — an funding unit that funds disruptive meals know-how corporations, similar to these creating plant-based alternate options to meat. She says the thought took place after encouraging the crew to assume in a different way about danger.
She has prioritised preserving high-value work in-house in order that the crew advantages from their involvement within the end result of circumstances, and understands the enterprise context. In 2020, she launched a six-pronged technique to advertise range.
Shannon Finch
Group normal counsel, Westpac
Shannon Finch grew to become group normal counsel of Australian financial institution Westpac final 12 months, when it was nonetheless managing the fallout from the 2017 Royal Commission into banking misconduct, which led to numerous high-profile circumstances in opposition to the financial institution. Finch made it her division’s purpose to succeed in settlements in all excellent circumstances introduced by the regulator — the Australian Securities and Investments Commission — this 12 months. This required altering the financial institution’s relationship with the regulator by changing into extra clear, and having a greater understanding of the problems that matter most to the regulators and the courts.
Finch’s goal as head of authorized is to concentrate on deep experience and constructing “centres of excellence” with small, agile groups that cowl quite a lot of talent units. In her view, a smaller crew is best at staying linked, constructing connections with the enterprise and adapting rapidly to altering markets.
Technology is her different massive focus. Her purpose is to see authorized companies built-in with the financial institution’s core software program platforms, in order that workers throughout the financial institution can use self-service instruments while not having to go to a particular authorized know-how platform.
Source: www.ft.com
