Role Of General Counsel In Business Operations

The 4th edition of the 'Global Summit & Legal Leaders Awards 2023,' presented and celebrated by BW Businessworld, recognises and celebrates law firms and lawyers making significant contributions in their practice domains. The initiative aims to foster excellence in the legal ecosystem by identifying and empowering law firms and individual lawyers, leading the way.

The event was marked by a powerful session whereby a discussion on the ‘Role Of General Counsel In Business Operations’ took place. The strong panel of industry experts include Amar Kumar Sundram, General Councel - Senior Vice President in Legal, NEC Corporation; Garima Budhiraja, Former Director Legal, MobiKwik; Pooja Bedi, Head of Legal & Compliance – India Sub Continent, Philips and Pooja Sehgal Mehtani, General Counsel & Company Secretary, Sun Life for the session. Moderated by Ruhail Amin, Senior Editor, BW Businessworld, various questions were raised such as the perception of in-house legal department as a cost or value add to the organisations, role of General Counsel in the present times, challenges faced by in-house legal departments while engaging with stakeholders and the relationship of General Counsel with stakeholders within the internal team and law firms.

Commenting on the perception legal department in the present scenario, Sundram stated, “Organisations now are not debating whether legal is a cost. We, as in-house lawyers bring a lot of value to the organisation, be it in terms of non-litigation peace or the litigation peace. The more important role of we as lawyers play is that we have an eye on the business operations and therefore we know where the business is going wrong and what decision they should take before actually deciding on a particular set of business and therefore we also ensure preventive litigations. Therefore, when we talk about preventive litigation peace, we are saving a lot of cost of the organisations. Having said that, like any other business unit, we also have a budget but we manage our budget very judiciously. We are no more a cost, but rather a value addition to the entire business.”

While talking about the role of General Counsel in the present scenario and the proactive reach-outs on legal matters, Bedi commented, “General counsel is no longer a role of absolute lawyering anymore. You have to have a skin in the game with the business people, you need to bear the strategic cap and also be, I would say that with a lot of emphasis, ‘Be the conscience keeper of the organisation’. Everybody wants to do business, but the GC makes sure that the business is being done the right way. So I guess, our roles have to elevate and no one else is going to do that for us, we have it do it for ourselves. So I believe that communication from that perspective is how accessible you are to all your business leaders, how you are able to find not just how to fix the problem but don’t let the problem happen kind of an approach. Moreover, you need the support of a lot of external players and a lot of external law firms.”

On the role of external counsel and regulated businesses in the landscape of startups, Budhiraja expressed, “The role of the external counsel becomes very important. Earlier, it was only crisis management but starts somewhere from the beginning where we don’t want that crisis to really happen in our conscience. We want to understand what the regulator is thinking if they have some doubts. Sometimes it doesn’t come, they are not very forthcoming about it. You have to kind of read between the words. Law firms do help us with that a lot. Of course, I was associated with a company where we were trying to go for an IPO, the kind of collaboration you need with external law firms, when you are going for an IPO, it's amazing. Evolution has come and that has come for the good. Even an external law firm has become like a business enabler for us.”

Furthermore, Bedi quotes, “I have a saying and I use it quite often with my team that the external counsel output is as good as good as internal counsel’s briefing and I always believe that the bridge that we need to create because we are seeking counsel on a legal advice and a point of law but adding it with a business is the sole endeavour happen when we collaborate well.”

On the concluding note, Mehtani talks about the complex relationship between the internal and external stakeholders, stating, “External law firms is a complimentary relationship and definitely has evolved as has a General Counsel’s role, similarly this relationship has evolved. The entire relationship of the General Counsel depends on the relationship you have with law firms, how you build on it, how you keep them posted and they help you in certain transactions, that is very vital. In a way, all revolves around how you collaborate and how do you manage the relationships. The relationship is complimentary to each other.”