Your Role as General Counsel

Acknowledgements 7

I. Introduction – why you need this Special Report 9

1. Who has this Special Report been written for? 9

2. How this Special Report is set out 10

II. Legal consigliere or functional manager? 13

1. Introduction 3

2. Functional managers 14

3. Legal consiglieri 14

III. The first 100 days 19

1. Creating a sense of success 19

2. Ways to generate ideas about a successful first 100 days 21

3. Credibility, rapport and trust 22

4. Listening 25

IV. Developing a legal strategy 29

1. A preliminary comment about strategy 29

2. Legal strategy 29

V. Managing the legal team 37

1. Finance 37

2. Marketing/business development 38

3. HR 40

4. Operations 46

5. Reflections on the legal team 48

VI. Building your department 49

1. The importance of teams 49

2. Be clear on the strategy 49

3. Devise a plan 50

4. And finally… 59

VII. Coaching and mentoring 61

1. Coaching 61

2. Mentoring 72

VIII. The GC and the board 75

1. Background to your board relationship 75

2. Build your relationship with the board with care 77

IX. Taking on the role of company secretary 83

1. A bit of background 83

2. Understand the nature of the role 84

3. Get an understanding of boards if you don’t already have one 87

X. What next? Reinventing yourself 91

1. The importance of thinking ahead 91

2. Re-evaluating your career 92

3. Staying in a legal role 93

4. Moving away from the GC role 94

5. Moving to a new career 95

Endnotes 99

About the authors 101

About Globe Law and Business 103

Notes and ideas 104