How do you approach managing legal aspects during periods of instability or crises, and how does your legal strategy align with the broader business strategy to ensure organisational resilience?  

2025 is opening up to be a challenging year of much uncertainty, globally. For example, the current US administration’s orders and policies (such as tariffs and the almost daily deluge of Executive Orders) creates uncertainty and even retaliation amongst many countries, with the risk that the impact (often not likely contractually contemplated for), having a domino effect on the Asia region. During such periods of instability or crisis, there is usually no ‘playbook’ or precedents to rely on. Solutions will have to be tailored by working closely with management and key stakeholders to address the context of the crisis – by being a strategic business partner and working closely together with the businesses, ensures alignment with their objectives. Sometimes, this can become extremely challenging because our Team looks after all construction business lines of the Group, across more than 13 jurisdictions in Asia, spanning over 50 separate entities / subsidiaries. As there is no ‘playbook’, my approach includes: Core Pillars (active listening, building trust, collective decision making by consensus); Methodology (anticipate, be solutions focused, be realistic, provide feasible proposals); if there is Disagreement (to openly express views, look for positive reasons not negative, seek solutions as a team). This approach is shared by the Team, whom is working closely with stakeholders to map out pitfalls and potential commercial / procurement / legal workarounds and we all collectively need to continue working closely with stakeholders in such context.

What is one leadership principle or practice that has had the greatest impact on your career as a GC?

The pursuit of collective interest, over personal “glory”. No one person can alone handle the significant volume of subjects that stakeholders expect from a legal team. It is critical that the right spirit and mindset are shared as a team, to be able to consistently deliver at a high level in today’s increasingly complex and demanding environment. When a legal team can perform together, it is a reflection to myself of how I have (or have not) performed as a GC.

In this regard, as GC of the Bouygues Construction Asia Legal Desk my governing principle is for the team is to be able to pursue the collective interest of the Group in the context of the matters we work on, rather than personal ambition, with a practice of being open and transparent spirit plus commitment to quality service delivery and next generation development for each team member. 

This is developed through clear communication and finding the right lawyers who have the right cultural fit for the team; as well as and more importantly for the GC and the senior members of the team to “lead by example, to “walk the talk” in synchronicity – as a practice, there is no formal hierarchical or rank formality within the team when it comes to work; all team members are encouraged to share their thoughts and ideas openly without judgment and good ideas and thoughts are taken on board in the best interest of the cases in question; case handlers (irrespective of seniority) will have exposure to stakeholders directly and will get credit for what they do; each team member is given exposure to various jurisdictions within our Asian remit (but not “pigeon-holed”) and spend time in our Group headquarters and regional jurisdictions to broaden their perspectives and build their internal network; appropriate level of work will be allocated to junior members with oversight and supervision by senior members of the team to provide guidance, direction and to create a space for them to develop further skills, qualities and knowledge that would allow and prepare them to take on more senior roles (i.e. to be more than a job, but a career and career development).

I believe that the above principles and practice(s) has significant impact on my role as GC and allows me to derive the most joy and satisfaction on a daily basis.

If you could change one thing about how businesses engage with their legal teams, what would it be and why?

Not really something that I believe “needs to change” in my organisation, but I believe it is something critical to have (which to a good extent does exist in my organisation) – the “one thing” is, early involvement of the legal team in key topics.

This is true whether the topic is of a more “front end” nature, such as structuring or contract negotiation. Stakeholders coming to the legal team early to share that negotiations are on the horison, allows time for critical things like partner / counterparty screening, compliance checks, structuring the cooperation framework, preparing for tax implications, early preparations for forms of contract, etc. Much of those would not be practicable if a legal team of given a very short notice to just “start work on a contract, now”, where the outcome is likely to poorer and less considered, from experience.

Early involvement is also beneficial, from a “back end” perspective, such as claims, disputes, adjudications, mediations, arbitrations or litigation. Early involvement of a legal team when stakeholders can sniff that a dispute could be occurring down the road, enables the legal team to do investigation and analysis of relevant facts (i.e. detailed fact finding), legal issues (maybe we are not as legally strong as we think), steer the manner, cycle and timing of correspondence (try to elicit responses that could be evidentiarily useful in a formal dispute), allow early preparation of key documents, line up potential witnesses (e.g. pre-taking statements in case they are immediately posted to another project after the current one completes) and map out the lead up to the dispute in a manner that favours stakeholders and could be efficient. These early preparatory steps, in my experience, could very well lead to settlement and avert a formal dispute altogether (which means significant time, money and resources savings for an organisation). If there is no early involvement and the first time a legal hears about a subject is that “a dispute has arisen”, and a defence has to be drafted and filed, we not only have no opportunity to avert a collision course dispute, but are left with little time to react and deliver a proper defence, which in the end ultimately disadvantages the organisation.

What do you see as the biggest challenge or opportunity for in-house legal teams in 2025, and how are you preparing for it?

I see potentially, three big challenges for in-house legal teams, one of which probably relates mainly to the construction sector. Firstly, the impact of the Trump Administration (policies, orders, etc). Secondly, the coming into force of the Security of Payment Ordinance (its impact on cash flow; on cost; on budgeting for experts and external advisors; does it improve the construction industry). Thirdly, the advent of AI (can we use it; how to use it ethically; how to use it without breaching solicitor professional conduct rules; and should we use). Due to limitations in length, I will focus on the first topic for this answer.

Although we are talking about the Asia region, there must be recognition that when the US makes policy shifts, it impacts the rest of the world. The challenge is that these policy moves or changes, has been happening on a nearly daily basis since Mr Trump took office about two months ago (as of end-March 2025). They rarely have passed Congress, but come in the form of Executive Orders which technically or contractually is not the same as legislation, but governments and organisations tend to behave as if they have the force of legislation.

To try and prepare for this, we have analysed all our key contracts (above a certain value) across Hong Kong, Singapore, Thailand, Philippines, Malaysia and other countries in Asia. We have looked at whether compensation (time and financial) could be possible due to “Trump impacts” along the following categories: (a) change in law; (b) shortage in goods or labour; (c) price adjustment / escalation; (d) acts of clients or their agents; (e) MAGA (aka Material Adverse Government Action); (f) force majeure / adverse circumstances; (g) impossibility; and (h) frustration. Contractually speaking, if we are impacted, the avenues of compensation, are difficult to track through – for example, a typical change in law clause would not work (because an Executive Order made in the US is not a change in law in HK for example), force majeure clauses are unlikely to work (because even if a US Executive Order is a “force majeure” event, because it did not occur in HK), common law remedies like impossibility and frustration have high thresholds which are difficult to overcome.

This is going to be a difficult area, for us all. We can be sure of more uncertainty, but we cannot be sure solutions are forthcoming. Owing to the breadth of imaginativeness of some of the Executive Orders to date, it cannot be ruled out that some “answer” might not be found and ultimately such Trump Administration originated impact (or reactions / retaliation to their actions). Although far from ideal, such impact might have to be rationalised as part of the general risk of doing business, any business.