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

Last year introduced many challenges to the world and directly impacted me as a general counsel. The heavy sanctions environment due to the political tensions was a significant issue for all legal practitioners in the world as we found ourselves required to tackle newly introduced restrictions of the sanctions imposed worldwide.

In your opinion, what areas should in-house lawyers focus on over the next few years to prove value to their organisations in Türkiye?

I believe we should focus on sustainable efficiency in everything we do; without it, it is almost impossible to deal with ever growing and changing needs of the business. In addition, some critical subject matters, such as data security and privacy, will continue to play a major role since data fuels all businesses.

Could you share an example of a time when you came up with an innovation that improved how your legal team works and did not come at a large expense?

I am a big fan of improving the ways of doing business by using technology, and I have introduced many technologies impacting the whole company related to the organisation’s legal needs. The most recent development was the Arçelik Contract Management (ACM) system which digitalised all contracting processes for all of Arçelik. With ACM, we can now digitally archive all of our contracts and track the whole process in the system.