Team size: 9 

What are the key projects that you have been involved in over the past 12 months? 

The legal department of DenizBank supports all aspects of the financial services offered by and regulatory matters affecting the bank. Our major focus lies in support of the corporate lending activities of the bank, particularly syndicated loans and loans supported by export credit agencies such as OeKB (Austria), Euler Hermes (Germany), SERV (Switzerland), SACE (Italy) and CREDENDO (Belgium). From a lending perspective, we have been supporting more deals covering commodity trade finance. From a regulatory perspective, the largest project over the last year has been the implementation of the EU’s Digital Operational Resilience Act. This has introduced numerous new controls and obligations on the bank’s own information systems as well as ICT services outsourced to third party providers. 

What do you think sets you apart from other in-house counsel?

I combine both the excellent skills of a strategic advisor to my clients at all levels of management with the established ability to build and lead teams of motivated and engaged lawyers and compliance experts.

What do you think are the most important attributes for a modern in-house counsel to possess?

An in-house counsel needs to operate beyond the confines of the mere legal and serve as a trusted advisor and solution creator regardless of the subject matter, obviously only to the extent that your experience permits a broader expression of knowledge. As an in-house counsel, you should seek to learn more than just purely legal topics – understand the products and services, the financials behind them, the skills of those that sell them and of those that support sales. You don’t have to be able to do all of those things, but you should be able understand them at a certain level so that you can advise holistically and partner with your clients at a deeper level.