About

A multi-national organisation often needs a multi-national legal team that can bring a diverse, broad range of ideas and experience to any situation. The Zurich-based EMEA legal team for gategroup – which owns a number of brands across the travel industry, including catering, hospitality, provisioning and logistics – brings exactly this dynamic. With responsibility for the provision of legal services to a client portfolio representing around half the annual turnover of gategroup, the EMEA legal team sit as partners at all levels of the organisation in developing pragmatic, innovative and legally compliant solutions in a heavily regulated environment. The gategroup EMEA legal team is comprised of Kevin Forjette, general counsel EMEA; Jasprit Sahnsi, senior legal counsel; Iwona Stasiewicz, legal counsel; and Meghan Park, senior paralegal. Each member of the team has worked in different countries, regions and legal roles prior to joining gategroup. Their broad experiences of local and regional cultural differences and legal requirements combined with their knowledge of the operational, commercial, labor, compliance and regulatory needs of the organisation makes them extremely efficient and effective strategists and trusted partners to the business and its leadership. Over the past two years there have been a number of organisational changes at gategroup including new divisions, downsizing, new leaders and new approaches to driving the business. Through these changes the EMEA legal team has remained agile in supporting management and embracing the change through professional and diligent work. Working through a strict budgeting process, negotiating outside counsel arrangements and discipline, the EMEA legal team has seen outside legal spend decrease despite increased obligations and workload. Indeed, a key strength of the team is its ability to embrace change and its associated challenges. This is further evidenced by the most recent organisational change in which the EMEA legal team has welcomed the inclusion of responsibility for gategroup’s global retail and retail-related technology offerings. The team has worked closely over the past two years with the chief of operations excellence and compliance playing an integral role in driving compliance within the organisation and rolling out business compliance committees within the region. This further underscores the breadth of the EMEA legal team’s scope of responsibility and ability to work collaboratively with all functions and disciplines within the organisation.