Career biography

Dr Stefan R. Sulzer has served as Group General Counsel of The Adecco Group since 2022, overseeing all legal, compliance, and regulatory matters across the company’s global operations. He supports the three Global Business Units—Adecco, Akkodis, and LHH—in more than sixty jurisdictions. The Adecco Group is the world’s leading talent advisory and workforce solutions company, with annual revenue of EUR 23.1 billion (2024) and approximately 167,000 employees worldwide, including technology experts and bench associates.

Stefan advises senior management and the Board of Directors on complex cross-border issues, develops and implements the organisation’s global legal and compliance strategy, and ensures adherence to applicable laws and regulations, including those relating to employment, data privacy, artificial intelligence, and corporate governance.

He leads a team of over 350 legal professionals operating from more than 40 locations. His team provides integrated legal support and advice across a broad range of areas, including sales, marketing, procurement, employment, intellectual property, competition, financing, data privacy, artificial intelligence, fraud, ethics, insurance, and third-party risk management.

Stefan spearheads an enterprise-wide legal transformation and innovation initiative to make the legal department more agile, proactive, innovative, and strategic. This initiative aims to future-proof the department against technological disruption and reposition of Legal & Compliance as a fully integrated, data-driven strategic partner to the business. It combines the adoption of advanced technologies—such as AI, machine learning tools, contract lifecycle management platforms, automated third-party risk solutions, and data analytics—with the creation and management of offshore Legal Shared Services teams in several jurisdictions. These shared-services hubs deliver scalable support for high-volume, end-to-end legal processes, driving measurable efficiency gains while maintaining best-in-class quality and compliance.

In 2023, the department became the first corporate legal team in Switzerland to deploy Harvey AI, further accelerating cycle times and enhancing decision-making across defined legal use cases. In 2025, The Adecco Group Legal Department was shortlisted for the Financial Times Innovative Lawyers Award–Europe in the category In-house – Innovation in Digital Solutions.

Before joining The Adecco Group, Stefan was General Counsel for North America and the Global Businesses at Alcon in Fort Worth, Texas, from 2018 to 2021. Between 2015 and 2018, he served as Head of Legal & Compliance for Latin America & the Caribbean, and from 2011 to 2015 as Associate General Counsel for M&A and Legal Transactions, both at Alcon in the US. From 2007 to 2011, he was Head of Corporate Finance Legal at Novartis in Basel, Switzerland. He began his legal career in private practice with Baker McKenzie in Zurich.

A Swiss national, Stefan holds an Economics degree from the School of Economics and Business Administration in Zurich, a Licentiatus Juris (JD) and a Doctor of Law (PhD) from the University of St. Gallen, and an LL.M. from the University of Michigan Law School in Ann Arbor, US. He is a licensed attorney in both Switzerland and New York, USA.

LEGAL TRANSFORMATION & INNOVATION

Under Stefan’s leadership, The Adecco Group’s Legal & Compliance function launched a bold, enterprise-wide legal transformation in 2022. The aim: to reposition Legal as a strategic partner, make the function future-ready, and drive efficiency, innovation, and agility in legal service delivery.

Core pillars of this transformation include:

Adoption of advanced legal technologies (AI, machine learning, CLM platforms, risk management tools)

Implementation of data analytics dashboards to provide insight into legal spend, litigation trends, contract risk, and compliance

Creation of Legal Operations and offshore Legal Enablement hubs

Deployment of Harvey AI in 2023—a first for a Swiss corporate legal team

Development of the department’s first AI legal agent, expected to launch by the end of 2025

Legal processes are being mapped, standardised, and optimised via dedicated Process Engineers, enhancing consistency and quality. Performance is measured using clear KPIs that link technology and process innovation to tangible business outcomes.

The department has also invested in:

Governance and compliance frameworks to address regulatory shifts

Training programmes to build digital literacy, project management, and legal risk capabilities

Change management to embed a culture of innovation, with a focus on attracting and retaining top legal talent

Looking beyond point solutions, Stefan is laying out the foundation for an agentic AI platform capable of delivering self-executing, self-improving legal services. This elevates the legal function from traditional guardians to a catalyst for innovation and strategic growth.

HOW DO YOU APPROACH MANAGING LEGAL ASPECTS DURING PERIODS OF INSTABILITY OR CRISES?

During periods of instability—whether geopolitical, cyber-related, or economic—I align the Legal & Compliance function with The Adecco Group’s resilience agenda, focusing on anticipation, agility, and accountability.

Anticipation: We run a continuous horizon-scanning programme that maps regulatory and litigation risks against the Group’s footprint, helping leadership pre-empt disruptions.

Agility: We use centrally defined crisis playbooks (covering force majeure, data breaches, business continuity, etc.) alongside decentralised decision rights, enabling local teams to act swiftly within Group risk tolerances.

Accountability: We embed legal KPIs into the Group’s crisis structure. Every action is logged, auditable, and tied to proactive stakeholder communication.

We also leverage AI-powered digital assistants, contract automation, and real-time legal intelligence to enhance our ability to respond to change. Legal actively supports rapid redeployment of talent, strategic partnerships, and commercial innovation—converting legal foresight into business value.

WHAT ARE THE MAIN CASES OR TRANSACTIONS YOU HAVE BEEN INVOLVED IN RECENTLY?

Recent highlights include:

High-stakes U.S. class action litigation, including wage-and-hour disputes and federal/state overlapping statutory claims

Multi-jurisdictional regulatory investigations (e.g. with the U.S. Department of Labor, EEOC, and EU data protection bodies), with a focus on minimising disruption and aligning remediation with business strategy

Strategic M&A transactions across the US and APAC, focusing on digital staffing, upskilling, and market expansion. The legal team manages full lifecycle support, from deal structuring through to post-close integration.

WHAT DO YOU SEE AS THE MAJOR LEGAL CHALLENGES FOR BUSINESSES IN SWITZERLAND OVER THE NEXT FIVE YEARS?

Key challenges include:

Complex regulatory frameworks: Swiss and EU laws on data privacy, AI, and platform labour are converging. We are embedding privacy-by-design, setting up an AI ethics board, and aligning governance across jurisdictions.

Sustainability compliance: The revised Swiss Code of Obligations mandates climate and non-financial disclosures. We’ve built a supply chain transparency platform and updated contracts with remediation and audit clauses.

Corporate integrity & transparency: New rules on whistleblowing, anti-corruption, diversity, and cyber-resilience are being codified. We’ve expanded internal investigations, launched horizon-scanning tech, and deployed organisation-wide ethics and cyber-awareness programmes.

To stay ahead, Swiss companies must combine legal expertise, digital fluency, and a strong compliance culture. Our Legal & Compliance team is embracing this by building multidisciplinary teams, applying advanced analytics, and maintaining transparent regulatory engagement.