Rethinking The Legal Function

For many heads of legal departments, the opportunity to further develop their business acumen is one of the major incentives of the job. However, GCs hold a unique place within companies, and their first responsibility is as legal counselor. It tends to be much more professionally rewarding to earn a reputation as a problem solver, instead of being the department that says “no,” but GCs must maintain their independence and keep a focus on their legal and ethical obligations.

Sometimes it makes sense to embed lawyers in the business units, rather than have them reside in the legal department. With this arrangement, GCs need to regularly remind their lawyers that they are lawyers first, and businesspeople second.

GCs in all cases need to leverage data and technology to stretch their limited time and budgets and manage their duties. Used properly, metrics provide insights into performance, value, compliance and cost. This is enabled by the fact that often legal departments possess a great deal of useful data, as well the technology to leverage it. Most GCs, in fact, are likely to feel they have too much data. In order to wade through it and put it to work, they need to automate many of the processes.

While the opportunities to be business partners and proactive strategists can be exciting, they also present challenges. To combine the best of legal and business skills, GCs need to calibrate their priorities, manage their time, and know where the pitfalls lay.