People go in-house for a variety of reasons, such as wanting to be more involved on the business side, and a desire for greater control over their schedule. The notion of in-house lawyers clocking off at 5pm went out with the dodo, but many in-housers report less fetishisation of the jacket-on-the chair culture than in private practice. Continue reading “In-house got talent? Bay area GCs on hiring”
Catherine McGregor: How does department structure impact on the motivation and incentives of your staff and direct reports? Continue reading “Playing it forward: team structure and motivation”
My team primarily provides legal services to the largest-scale commercial transactions, bond and securities issues, divestitures, joint ventures and M&A. There’s obviously an imperative to avoid litigation, or situations that could lead to the potential for litigation. CNOOC considers a huge number of opportunities, so we get exposed to many potentially high-profile deals, but we only look at about 5% of all the opportunities we’re offered seriously. Continue reading “In-house life – Leslie Zhang Cnooc”
Lawyers are commonly viewed as deal breakers who protect their clients right out of deals. General counsel would be wise not to dismiss this notion – justified or not – and we can to respond to it on multiple levels.
It’s mid-December when I pay a visit to John Lewis, and as I’m waiting in the foyer of the aptly named Partnership House, I notice that most head office staff are sporting Christmas jumpers. When senior commercial lawyer Amy Holt arrives to greet me, she too is decked out in festive knitwear – putting paid to any notions of stuffiness in the retail chain’s commercial legal team.
Continue reading “From client to colleague: the John Lewis partnership”
This is a question posed by Jacques Barthélémy of Cabinet Barthélémy Avocats in Paris. He is writing in the 2014 European Company Lawyers Association [ECLA] white paper, which calls for all in-house lawyers in Europe to be recognised as independent professionals – and afforded the legal privilege enjoyed by their peers in private practice.
GC: When you joined HBO Europe in 2011, you undertook a review of the company’s legal systems. Could you tell us a little bit about that process?
Gordon Finlayson (GF): I’ve been with the business now for three years, and I came in at a point when it had changed quite significantly in terms of its management and ownership structure. It had previously been a joint venture between Disney, Sony and HBO, and HBO bought out the business shortly before I arrived. As part of that change, our CEO, Linda Jensen, brought on board a number of new members of senior management.
Continue reading “Revolution! How a GC unified processes and rolled out a bespoke IT system”
In the summer of 2008, Cambridge-based infrastructure software firm Autonomy Corporation [now HP Autonomy] began working on a US acquisition. A UK-listed public company, Autonomy had its eye on California-based software company Interwoven, and a deal valued at $775 million. Such a large takeover would require Autonomy to approach its institutional investors for funding, through a placing to raise £220 million, and to set up a new revolving credit facility of up to $200 million.
That’s quite a big question. I would argue “a lot”. If we accept that premise, then we can move on to a far more interesting discussion: how?
Debt and equity are the two options a company has when choosing how to finance itself. In debt financing, the business borrows money in some form without giving the lender any ownership rights in the company. The company issues bonds which can be bought and sold in the same way as shares. Unlike a share, which is equity in the business, a bond is essentially a loan with a fixed rate of interest.
Continue reading “The 5-minute financial analyst: financial markets”