It is not easy to be an in-house lawyer. Thank goodness, however, because if it was why on earth would any business want to employ a lawyer? In fact, why would any lawyer go to the trouble of that expensive and gruelling training and working hours that risk burnout; then, just when they reach the point they can capitalise on their powers, decide to hop into a featherbed of routine, low-risk work that is more ‘admin’ than law? Surely the job being difficult is part of the attraction? Difficulty is also some justification for lawyers to be among the most expensive bodies on the payroll. Continue reading “The lexicon of inefficiency”

Can Dave Lewis save Tesco? Will Bob Dudley turn BP around? Journalists and financial analysts ask these questions, and headline writers dutifully stick them at the top of the page. But the questions are absurd. We should stop asking them.

Consider an international business employing tens of thousands, perhaps hundreds of thousands of people. There are country managers, divisional heads, and a senior executive team, all reporting into a board of directors that sits above the lot of them. No big decision should be taken by a chief executive on their own. Good corporate governance requires that checks and balances are applied, in particular by the board. Continue reading “If it is lonely at the top for your CEO, sort out your reporting lines and help”

I love my career. I haven’t loved it at all times. Over the years it was tough. But over time I became more confident, the anxiety passed and I got into the interesting aspects of what I was doing. I got to enjoy it very much. Continue reading “Perspectives: Dan Fitz, BT”

‘There’s a serious danger of a regulator trying to regulate something that it doesn’t understand,’ says Kingfisher group general counsel and company secretary Clare Wardle. Her comment comes as the Solicitors Regulation Authority (SRA) works on another overhaul of its handbook, halfway through a two-year review that will end in 2017, a process that has clear plans to be more inclusive of the in-house profession.

When asked what in-house lawyers would make of its current handbook and code of conduct, SRA chief executive Paul Philip concedes: ‘They would probably say quite a lot of the regulations that we put out are not directly applicable to them and they need clarity. That’s what we’re trying to provide.’ Continue reading “Lost in translation”

I’ve been advocating for some time that the ‘Trusted Adviser’ description of in-house counsel and GCs has the potential to encourage too much detachment between those lawyers and the organisations that employ them. While there must be some level of professional detachment, I encourage proactivity, dubbing this approach the ‘Ethical Champion’ − a style more akin to an investigating magistrate than a member of the judiciary. My research at Cranfield has found that counsel who are proactive and investigative are more likely to end up in positions where they can maintain an ethical stance. Continue reading “Who do you think you are?”

I want to give you an overview of my theory about the inside counsel revolution. It is clear it has happened in the US. It is happening to a degree in Europe and in Asia. General counsel have become much more sophisticated, capable and influential, transforming law and business in two ways. Inside the company, the GC has become the primary counsellor to the chief executive and board, replacing the law firm senior partner. He or she leads corporate units beyond the law.

The role has become comparable in importance to the chief financial officer (CFO) due to the increased global complexity and the rising importance of ‘business in society’ issues. There has been a dramatic change in the skill, the experience, the breadth and the compensation of the GC. Continue reading “A new vision for general counsel”

It is the business issue that has dominated headlines for months and represents for UK plc a potentially far more profound impact than any general election or change of government. The vote on 23 June on the UK’s membership of the EU promises ominous levels of uncertainty for business and unprecedented challenges for general counsel (GCs) trying to help their companies manage systemic risks. In the second part of a collaboration withHerbert Smith Freehills (HSF), we gathered a group of senior in-house counsel to assess what legal teams should be doing now… and potentially on 24 June. Continue reading “The big uneasy”

IHL: What initiatives has Microsoft and its legal department pioneered to promote ethnic diversity?

Mary Snapp: Microsoft’s legal department has had a focused diversity team for 12 years. Brad Smith [Microsoft’s president and chief legal officer] and I collaborated to start the diversity team within the department, which grew to include 85 people. Our original focus on women and racial and ethnic minorities has been sustained, but we have added other areas of diversity and inclusion focus over time, such as people with disabilities and US military veterans. Continue reading “Change partners”

‘I believe very strongly in leading by example,’ says Nokia global head of litigation Richard Vary. Although his legal team has a formal mentoring system in place, Vary maintains that it is the informal connections inherent in mentoring that play the most important role in developing in-house counsel. ‘You bring the people along, they see what you do, they see how you work rather than [you] telling people how to do their jobs. They’re professionals, they know what they’re doing. They’re intelligent – you give them the space to figure it out for themselves but also give them an example of the model of behaviours that you want.’ Continue reading “None so zealous”

Taken in isolation – and at £35bn, one of the largest oil and gas deals on record stands pretty well on its own – the acquisition of BG Group by Shell could be seen as a bellwether for a confident oil and gas market. But headline deals aside, the freefall in oil prices has had a lasting negative effect on the sector. And while the price of crude passed the psychologically important level of $50 per barrel recently, the attritional effect of the last 18 months is there to see. Continue reading “Crude measures”

The UK Continental Shelf (UKCS) is a mature oil and gas basin. The collapse in global oil prices from a high of $115 per barrel in June 2014 to a price below $30 a barrel earlier this year has had a severe impact on the basin. Although according to Oil & Gas UK (OGUK) UKCS production actually rose by almost 10% in 2015, revenues fell by 30%. Continue reading “The oil price collapse – UK regulators to the rescue?”

Two books of note have just been published by veteran lawyers – The Inside Counsel Revolution: Resolving the Partner-Guardian Tension by former GE legal head Ben Heineman and The Future of the In-House Lawyer: The General Counsel Revolution, a collection of essays edited by Carillion’s Richard Tapp. The common ground is obvious in charting the wresting of power and resource over the last 25 years from law firm to corporate legal teams. Continue reading “GCs have arrived and all we have to welcome them are platitudes”