Are you a first-time GC, or looking to move your career in house? We get it, the struggle is real!
Here’s a replay of our first ever 'Ask the Expert', where Hank Greenberg shared his thoughts on what you need to know as a first-time GC.
Key Takeaways:
- Set & drive your own goals
- Build and promote integrity & trust
- Redirect legal outputs as inputs
- Be more than just a lawyer
- Be willing to put your name on everything
- Keep things simple, yet be ready to answer tough questions
- Find & maintain your voice as a leader
Meet the Presenters:
- Host: Raad Ahmed
- CEO & Co-founder at Lawtrades, giving busy GC’s the superpower to do more, with less
- Presenter: Hank Greenberg
- General Counsel at Oscar Health, a health company utilizing technology, design, and data to humanize health care.
What To Expect:
3:30-5:02
- How to build a model to do the GC job: common ideas, skills, principles
- Work-in-progress
- There is no one size fits all
- Success can and will look different
Design your Agenda:
5:02-8:28
- Agenda is what differentiates a lawyer from a GC
- Budget resources across the team
- Understand where your priorities lie
- Deploy your agenda as a leader
- Set your own workflow
- Understand risk according to company framework
- Use your voice to catalyze action
Understand the Business:
8:28-13:42
- Grasp full bounds of risk
- GC has to understand the operations and strategic goals of the company
- Know the market - how it works, and what it does
- Share knowledge with lawyers working with you
- Legal analysis as an input, rather than an output
- Forces you to strategize market risk
- Starting point for guidance to client
Handling C-Suite:
17:50-21:55
- Build credibility
- CEO and CFO should see you as a trustworthy person
- Convey pertinent issues to clients so as to minimize work they have to do
- Clients do not need to know or understand the intricacies of law
- You can’t be a one-stop-shop for everything
- It is okay to admit you do not know an answer
- Make sure to circle back when you find answers
Be a Paid Skeptic:
26:23-29:49
- Test other’s ideas and conclusions
- Do not rely wholesale on advice without testing it yourself
- Play the role of CEO or CFO
- Be ready to face the rigor of underlying assumptions
- You are an expert of your client
- Trust your legal team, stop comparing to strategies of competitors
Find Your Voice:
33:40-40:45
- You are not just another lawyer
- Recognize the immense power and authority you hold
- Wield power in a responsible way
- Build your own integrity, promote your confidence
- Set rules for behavior
- Form a list of values you adhere to every single day
- Be direct, use analysis as an input
- Do not need to deploy rationale for everything
- Utilize concise (yes or no) answers
- Develop a simple style of communication
- Be ready to explain pertinent answers
- “Spoon feed” info by utilizing layman’s terms