In-house Counsel as Business Partner conference: the influencers

What do CEOs want? And what should general counsel demand in exchange? The keys to being successful are diplomacy, tone and knowing you will not agree on everything.

The Lawyer’s In-house Counsel as Business Partner conference (IHBP) highlighted discussions on how to get the in-house lawyer’s voice heard in the boardroom, what CEOs want from their in-house lawyers and what general counsel should look for in their chief executives.

“Sometimes general counsel can get the tone wrong because they don’t have as much experience on what makes that business tick,” Centaur Media CEO Andria Vidler explained in an interview with The Lawyer editor Catrin Griffiths. “When a GC treats the role as if it’s in any other business it is unlikely that they are going to be able to get into the business enough to win everyone over and for their opinion to be sought after.”

Relationship-building

General counsel seeking to increase their standing in the boardroom must be aware of not inadvertently encroaching on another’s roles.

Ofqual director of legal Natalie Prosser told the conference: “Every time you step out of your legal role you’re stepping into someone else’s territory. The only way you can overcome this is to build personal relationships. But that can be quite threatening.

“Sometimes you will be resented and your role will be resented. Sometimes you’ll be in conflict with other members of the exec and sometimes their reaction can be ‘get off my turf’.”

An important factor to measure effective influence at board level is internal feedback. MRC Global executive vice-president corporate affairs, general counsel and corporate secretary Dan Churay said: “A lot of that comes down to how well the GC is managing the process of the board and helping them get their job done.”

“The steer I got was that what they wanted to have was the bigger strategic picture,” Prosser added. “Having the conversation about what they want me to bring to the table is important.”

Who wants to be a CEO?

Those general counsel seeking to make the jump to a CEO role should beware. Not everyone has the skill-set necessary to survive.

“Demonstrating that you can be a leader and that you’re not just telling people what to do is important,” Vidler said. “I think lawyers backed with fact and evidence are good at persuading people on the right route to go down. They’re not always as good at persuading people and motivating them to do things.”

140 top GCs have their say

The two-day conference at the Montcalm Hotel in London saw around 140 general counsel, heads of legal, in-house counsel and CEOs gather to talk about the major trends in the industry and the challenges facing in-house teams today.

The speaker line-up featured Vodafone Group legal director Kerry Phillip, Ofqual director of legal Natalie Prosser, Royal London general counsel Fergus Speight, Bupa chief legal officer Penny Dudley, British Airways head of legal Andrew Fleming, Metro Bank general counsel Sally-Ann James, Pernod Ricard senior legal adviser Ingrid Cope and Asda general counsel Alex Simpson.

Topics discussed during the conference included effective risk management, the CEO’s perspective on what makes successful in-house counsel, how general counsel can get their voices heard within their businesses, as well as technology and regulatory hurdles.

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