A buyers’ market – The trends and traumas in adviser reviews

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The trend for reduced panels has seen law firms put through their paces by clients eager to drive innovation and control spend. Legal Business reviews the reviews

In-house teams may have grown in size and stature over recent years, but their external adviser panels are definitely shrinking. As a result, law firms find themselves increasingly at the sharp end during adviser reviews (see box ‘Cutting back’, below), with clients pushing for better rates, greater efficiencies and added extras.

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Client profile: David Symonds, Johnson Controls International

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The conglomerate’s EMEA GC on forging a groundbreaking sole-adviser mandate and its recent $16.5bn merger

In an area of the profession obsessed with talking up innovation and downplaying costs, David Symonds, EMEA general counsel (GC) for recently merged entity Johnson Controls International (JCI), is a name synonymous with both.

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A private function – the in-house counsel making their way in the thrusting world of private equity

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Working under the radar, in-house lawyers in the fast-paced world of private equity operate in a unique environment

Unlike their private practice counterparts, in-house private equity (PE) lawyers prefer a low profile. Or, as one private practice partner puts it: ‘PE is a murky, sharp-elbowed world. In-house lawyers like to stay out of the limelight.’

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GC Powerlist Ireland: A team effort

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The launch party for our second GC Powerlist Ireland, this time focusing on teams, brought together the country’s strongest in-house legal departments

The recent launch of our GC Powerlist: Ireland Teams, hosted in Dublin by McCann FitzGerald, was attended by a host of companies operating in the country including Ulster Bank, Facebook, EY, An Post and Ryanair. The following pages list the in-house legal teams that made the list.

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GC Powerlist Summer Reception – Home House truths

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Ambition, Millennials, corporate guff – we gathered more than 60 GCs and FT columnist Lucy Kellaway to debate the pleasures and perils of climbing the greasy pole

Should you tweet? How do you relate to the mysterious breed of co-workers called Millennials? How should lawyers navigate the rampant office politics of a major plc when they make the move in-house?

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Client profile: Maaike de Bie, Royal Mail Group

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The new group general counsel on handling a recently privatised 500-year-old institution.

Royal Mail’s group general counsel (GC) Maaike de Bie likes to do things a little differently. Originally from the Netherlands, de Bie was the first person to arrive at Canada’s McGill University having never studied in English before. She then relocated to New York, completed the New York Bar and joined White & Case in the early 1990s, and says she was the first foreigner working there as a US associate. In some ways it is unsurprising that the international lawyer has found herself at the helm of a British institution still in the throes of a transition from long-time government-owned entity to public limited company.

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Client profile: Michael Shaw, The Royal Bank of Scotland

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The veteran corporate lawyer on memorable moments in deal making and untangling himself from Barclays

‘It was ambition that made me decide to leave Barclays,’ declares self-confessed deal junkie Michael Shaw, who resigned from his role as the bank’s deputy general counsel (GC) in the summer of 2015.

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The new order – the first response for GCs to the post-Brexit environment

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A post-Brexit landscape poses many legal hurdles for corporates operating within the UK. Legal Business asks senior in-house counsel how they plan to navigate the uncertainty

Having seen Legal & General’s shares initially tumble on the Friday morning immediately after the UK’s vote to leave the EU – like so many financial services businesses – general counsel (GC) Geoffrey Timms is concerned that the business impact of Brexit could become a self-fulfilling prophecy. ‘Markets are emotional rather than factual. We can talk ourselves into trouble. There’s this end-of-the-world view online. Britain is still in a good place. Yes, the government has to fight uncertainty, but so does Europe. One hopes common sense will prevail.’

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Working smarter – eight ideas to upgrade your team

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As in-house teams handle more complex work, GCs are coming under pressure to rethink their tactics. Here are eight ideas to upgrade your legal team

Let’s start with an assumption: we will reach peak in-house. Though the in-house profession has hugely expanded over the last 15 years – those in the private sector growing threefold since 2000 to over 16,000 solicitors in England and Wales by 2015 – in-house legal teams cannot keep growing forever.

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