About

Peter Beshar began his legal career in government, firstly for a federal judge in New York and then as special assistant to former secretary of state Cyrus Vance, as part of the International Conference on the former Yugoslavia in the early 1990s. His private practice career was similarly impressive, seeing him make partner at Gibson, Dunn and Crutcher where he was also co-chair of the firm’s securities litigation group and an extremely prominent personality at the organisation. Joining Marsh & McLennan Companies in 2004, he has had a profound effect on the development of the company’s legal team since then. When discussing the formation of a legal team, Beshar says, ‘you first need to have a philosophy as well as a vision and framework of how to implement this and structure the department. At Marsh & McLennan we first had a relatively small number of lawyers in the corporation reporting in to businesses and reporting locally. I put into practice my philosophy of having a single integrated legal department’. He now takes charge of an extremely large and highly qualified legal, compliance and public affairs department of around 450 individuals. Beshar believes that ‘relationships with peers will define your success in the role’ as an in-house lawyer. ‘Without proper relationships you are unlikely to be effective for the CEO’, he says.