The Abstract

Do general counsels need to care about geopolitics? Is now the right time to start a legal tech company? And should you consider growing your team in a place other than Silicon Valley, like Rwanda? Join Sean West, Co-Founder at Hence Technologies and writer at Geolegal.substack.com, as he explains how he became a geopolitical forecaster for corporations and hedge funds at Eurasia Group, then chose...

As top legal leaders across a variety of industries, our podcast guests are no strangers to building teams from scratch and scaling them to adapt to the needs of a rapidly expanding business.   Listen as we share some of our favorite words of advice from past episodes about hiring and growing elite legal teams from some of the most seasoned general counsels and executives working today. Read...

How can the general counsel become a true partner to the executive team? How about in the context of a public company? How can the general counsel ensure that that same can-do attitude that they bring to the table pervades the rest of their legal team? Join Matt Campobasso, General Counsel at Enfusion, as he shares stories and lessons from his unique legal career: starting as a prosecutor outside...

How can corporate leaders make compliance training entertaining enough that their employees will pay attention? How do you know if compliance training is effective? What has a founder in this space learned about building for and selling to HR and legal? Join Roxanne Petraeus, Co-Founder and CEO of Ethena, as she discusses how her company is changing compliance training by making it more personalis...

What skill set should the Chief of Staff to a Chief Legal Officer of a major international corporation need? How do you build trust with a Chief Operating Officer? How do you cultivate the right culture with a large legal and compliance team? Join Zoe McMahon, Chief of Staff, VP of Legal Strategy and Operations at HP, as she shares stories and lessons from her thirty-year career at the world’s sec...

Where's the intersection in a career as a creative and as a lawyer? What stories would you tell if you were writing a play about your career in startup law? How do you go and convince some accomplished actors to sign up and perform it off-broadway?   Join Sarah Feingold, the legal expert and playwright behind Dirty Legal Secrets: Based on True Startups—running Off-Broadway this October in New...

How do you turn your passion for sports into a career? What does it take to advise pro athletes and celebrities on investments and deals? And how can you start to angel invest yourself? Sunjay Mathews, investor, advisor, and dealmaker in the sports and media sector, was able to make the leap from in-house counsel at FanDuel and DAZN, the biggest names in sports betting and streaming, into a legal...

How should General Counsel and legal teams be leveraging generative AI? How do you get started on your AI journey and what mistakes should you avoid? Where is the AI revolution heading? Join Cecilia Ziniti, Founder and CEO of GC AI, as she discusses how and why she made the leap from working as a corporate lawyer to creating a generative AI product specifically designed for in-house counsel. Find...

Join Jules Polonetsky, CEO and Founder of the Future of Privacy Forum, as he shares lessons he learned from the front lines of ad tech starting in the early 1990s. Starting his career in politics as a New York assemblyman and working his way into consumer protection-focused public roles, he became one of the first chief privacy officers in the tech industry at companies like DoubleClick and AOL at...

Can playing cards teach you to be a better lawyer? How do you make it in Silicon Valley without the traditional big law firm experience? And how do you make the jump to public company general counsel? Join Andrew Woods, General Counsel at PubMatic, as he discusses the unique path he forged from professional poker player to legal star. From founding a think tank at Harvard focused on poker and law...

How do you make the leap from lawyer to founder? How do you craft the perfect pitch? What does it take to fundraise effectively? And how far will your legal know-how take you when you’re accountable for every function in the business? Join Aaron Gregory, Co-founder and CEO of Upwardli, as he shares his journey from general counsel to start-up leader. Starting his career in the highly regulated tel...

How can C-suite leaders take on challenging political issues that affect their company? How do you pursue a path of professional growth at a company over the course of a decade? What's required for taking on wide-ranging responsibilities at the executive level? Join Kristin Sverchek, President of Lyft, as she discusses how she joined a small start-up as their first general counsel and grew with it...

What do you need to know if you're ready to launch a government affairs strategy? How do you find the right lobbyist? And how has lobbying for tech companies changed over the last decade? Join Matt Tanielian, Co-founder of Franklin Square Group, a bipartisan government relations, as he shares key insights from his decades of experience advocating for tech companies and bridging the gap between Sil...

How do you raise nine figures in financing in twelve hours as the first Twitter-fueled bank run is happening around you and you feel the pressure of hundreds and thousands of employees depending on your ability to finish the deal so their paychecks clear? Join Vanessa Wu, GC at Rippling, as she relives the moment her company overcame the disastrous collapse of Silicon Valley Bank and pulled throug...

What do you need to know if you're considering taking on the people function? What's the difference between a chief people officer and a CHRO? And are GCs well-positioned to take on both of these roles simultaneously? Rachel Olchowka, Former Chief People Officer and General Counsel at Fetch and current Chief Administrative Officer at Prizm Insurance, had no hesitations when she volunteered to oper...

How do you help CEOs transition out of the business? How do you project calm in a time of crisis? Can you draw on the experience of beating cancer twice as you navigate the challenges of executive leadership?   Dan Haley, General Counsel and Corporate Secretary at Guild, has led a career spanning the world of local Massachusetts politics, leading legal at companies like Sprinklr, and Athenahe...

How is AI going to change the practice of law? How is one of the most forward looking law firms adapting? And will the billable hour go away?   Joe Green, Chief Innovation Officer at Gunderson Dettmer and Cofounder & Director of the Open Cap Table Coalition, steered a law career starting at major Wall Street firm Simpson Thacher towards the worlds of tech and product management, with stop...

How do you build a legal and business career from a passion for aviation? What is the transition like from the GC role to that of CEO? And what is it like to run an airline?   Ben Klein, CEO and First Officer at Aero, was able to combine his dedication to legal work with his lifelong love of flying. Starting off at big law firms like Davis Polk & Wardwell, he successfully transitioned int...

How do you build trust with investors who tap you for the CEO role? How do you prepare yourself to lead companies through some of their toughest moments, including bankruptcy, and guide other companies through their transformations as a board member? Chelsea Grayson, managing partner of corporate restructuring at Pivot > and former CEO and board member of brands like American Apparel, True Reli...

Read detailed summary:  https://www.spotdraft.com/podcast/episode-46 Topics: Introduction: 0:00 Deanna Papedis on adopting a strategic mindset and keeping your eye on the big picture: 1:05 Hardeep Singh on congratulating yourself when you reach a career milestone: 2:10 Vineet Shahani on dealing with career lows and leaning on your communication skills: 3:50 Nguyễn Vu on establishing strong re...

What does a former GC-turned-executive recruiter wish she'd known about creating a personal brand, working with search firms, and negotiating the offer? How do executive recruiters help take careers where they need to go—not just to the next level? And when is the right time to start building a meaningful relationship with executive recruiters? Joelle Khoury, consultant at Egon Zehnder, built a to...

How can training to be a professional opera singer translate into the legal operations profession? How do you build a career in legal ops without any formal training? And what role should technology play–if any–in a strong legal ops program? Cory Clines, Legal Operations Manager at Campari Group, was able to transfer valuable lessons from his life as a conservatory-trained opera singer into his fi...

If you're a foreign-trained lawyer who wants to move to the U.S., how do you find a job? Why should companies look to foreign-trained lawyers in an increasingly globalized world? And how should you navigate moments of big career transitions? Flavia Naves, former general counsel at Circle, relocated to the United States after studying law in her native country of Brazil, and went on to become an au...

How does the nature of an organization change the design of its legal operations program? How can leaders of all types embrace innovations that legal ops professionals are bringing to legal ops departments? What are the most important things legal ops leaders need to know about the business? Susan Packal, Head of Global Legal Operations at Atlassian, learned the most important aspects of legal ops...

How has the legal ops profession evolved over the years? What was it like to be there at the birth of legal ops? And how can you break into the field now?   DeAnna Papedis, head of legal contract & product program management & operations at Google, has been with the tech giant for eighteen years, building up their massive legal ops departments from a team of legal assistants. Stepping...