What has been the number one challenge that has impacted you over the past year?

It has been an incredibly challenging and rewarding year. I think that the challenges can be summed up in three overarching themes.

The first is doing more with less. In my experience, the trend of expecting in-house legal business units to increase output while decreasing input (time, money, resources) continues and will remain a key challenge. This is especially pertinent as the global economy faces headwinds and the costs of operating a business come under ever-increasing scrutiny. This trend necessitates pressure on legal managers and practitioners to find time to identify and implement efficiencies while balancing a highly demanding workload.

The second is employee value proposition. Prior to the pandemic, in-house roles had a competitive advantage in that flexible and remote working arrangements were common. The pandemic has forced other employers of legal practitioners to offer flexibility and support diversity in working arrangements in a way we haven’t seen before. This, along with other global trends in the labour market, has eroded the comparative appeal of the employee value proposition for in-house roles and made talent acquisition and retention more challenging.

The third is increased enterprise risk. Much has been written about the increasing regulatory burden and it is real. In addition to that responsibility, particular events (e.g., cyber-attacks) and additional trends (e.g., the focus on environmental, social and corporate governance) have seen an increased risk of litigation and major legislative overhauls. It goes without saying that addressing climate change, social inequities and protecting customers are all issues that need to be addressed, but they do result in significant additional workload for in-house lawyers.

Looking forward, what technological advancements do you feel will impact the role of in-house legal teams in the future the most?

I believe there is still room to leverage existing technology for most in-house legal business units (ranging from simple process mapping and improvement to advanced adoption of artificial intelligence). I think the advent of artificial intelligence chatbots presents an opportunity (not a threat) to improve the working lives of in-house lawyers, but not supplant them.

What would you say are the unique qualities required to be successful as an in-house lawyer in your industry?

The automotive industry is about providing consumers with high-value, technologically sophisticated products and services. The automotive industry is, like many other industries, living through an era of disruption and transformation that affords in-house lawyers new and exciting opportunities. In that context, being nimble and adaptable are essential qualities for an in-house lawyer in this industry. We should be advising on new products and services, exploring different areas of law, identifying new risks and providing innovative solutions in partnership with our internal clients.