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

Maintaining an engaged and connected team whilst balancing the new hybrid way of working has been a challenge. For in-house legal teams, the ability to share perspectives, trade knowledge and ask questions is crucial to building team engagement. Additionally, a strong team connection increases the team’s overall capacity to provide holistic and practical legal support to the business. My team is fortunate in that we embraced flexibility pre-Covid, but with more of the team and business working remotely more often, we’ve had to adapt how we engage with the business and each other to ensure that we maintain an enabling mindset to the provision of advice and guidance to our teams.

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

‘AI’ is the current buzzword doing the rounds at the moment! However, I don’t feel that ‘AI’ in itself is the future of how legal teams will operate. Technology that best enables and improves connection between in-house lawyers and the businesses they support will have a positive impact. Businesses have already demonstrated the benefits of using remote working solutions to manage the new digital workplace, but maintaining in-person human connection is still vital, particularly in building relationships within your business (a key priority for in-house legal teams). Technology that is intuitive and improves processes will also have a positive impact on legal teams. Reducing the time lawyers spend on administrative processes and repetitive tasks will afford legal teams greater headspace to focus not only on the legal issues, but also the strategic, commercial, ethical and practical considerations in-house counsel can offer.

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

As part of a dynamic, innovative media organisation that aims to inspire all Australians to explore, respect and celebrate our diverse world, the SBS legal team is privileged to provide advice and guidance on a wide range of matters requiring legal and commercial intelligence in an inclusive and diverse environment. Legal skills and knowledge can be learned, but it is the qualities that lawyers have beyond their law degrees that make the most difference. There are many such qualities, but some which I believe contribute to success in the media industries are curiosity, connection, creativity, and courage. Be curious about the world, asking questions to ensure you understand the issue is important for both lawyer and client. Find opportunities to connect with those you work with, building vital trust through inclusivity and understanding. Get creative with the ways you communicate advice to suit a diverse audience with diverse needs. Just because it’s always been done a certain way, does not mean there aren’t better ways to do it. Finally, have the courage to offer a perspective on a non-legal matter if it’s relevant. Working in-house gives lawyers the scope to be more engaged in the organisation and its purpose, safe in the knowledge that you are in it together, working towards the same goal.