Counsel to Counsel - Career Advice for Lawyers

In this episode, I speak with Bob Licht, a partner in both the Life Sciences and Business and Technology Companies Groups at the law firm Choate Hall & Stewart in Boston.   Bob is an experienced business attorney who focuses on corporate and transactional work for life sciences companies. Prior to joining Choate, he spent 8 years as Chief Corporation Counsel for Biogen.

I’ve known Bob for over 20 years and more than any lawyer I know, Bob has been great at reinventing himself every few years.

If you are like most attorneys, you went to law school because you were looking for a challenging career that would provide you with opportunities to keep learning and growing.  In a law firm, this might mean serving a range of clients. Each new client presents a chance to learn about a new company and maybe even a new industry.

For lawyers who go in-house, growth may come from expanding the scope of the work.  A lawyer who joins a corporate law department because she understands corporate transactional work and governance may also find herself handling day to day employment issues, IP, real estate and even litigation.

But what happens when you go in-house and you decide you would like to try out a new industry, maybe one that is growing rapidly like biopharma.  How do you make the transition from a more conventional business to an industry where you have limited experience?

Bob Licht is someone who has done this several times in his career.  After law school, he began practicing at the old Boston firm, Hill and Barlow.  Hill and Barlow no longer exists but in its heyday, it was one of the top firms in Boston.  After more than a decade at Hill and Barlow, Bob decided it was time to go in-house and he joined Harcourt General, a publishing, specialty retail, motion picture exhibition and corporate venture capital business.  

Since then, he has held positions in financial services, a large supermarket chain, a startup grocery delivery company and at one of the largest biopharma companies in the world, Biogen.

I get together with Bob every so often and I’ve always been impressed with the way Bob has used his network to find the next opportunity.  Today Bob has come full circle and he is back in private practice. We are going to discuss how he managed to change industries so many times and what is was like to take on these new challenges.

In this episode, I interview Corey Dennis, Director of Privacy and Counsel at Pharmaceutical Product Development in North Carolina.  Corey talks about his transition from an associate focused on litigation to in-house corporate counsel and how he leveraged his expertise in privacy to make this transition.

I speak to a lot of lawyers about their careers and over the years, I have seen a number of themes.  One recurring theme is that many lawyers express interest in transitioning into in-house roles. In-house is seen as a place where a lawyer can become more part of the “team”.  It is also perceived as an opportunity for better work/life balance. Whether this is actually true is a good subject for debate but it remains a goal of many lawyers in private practice.

For corporate transactional lawyers, there is a path to in-house that seems clear and we have spoken about this in other episodes of Counsel to Counsel.  But for litigators, the path is less obvious. Litigation is a service that many corporations outsource. While some companies regularly handle litigation in-house, there are fewer direct opportunities to apply these skills in a corporate environment.

Corey Dennis is someone who has successfully made this transition and he did it by establishing himself as an expert in privacy.

Since 2013, he has worked for PPD, a global contract research organization provides clinical research, laboratory, and related services to  leading biopharma and medical device companies. But prior to that, Corey was an associate at midsized and boutique law firms in Massachusetts focusing on corporate litigation, compliance, and employment law.  He is a graduate of Suffolk University School of Law.

Show Highlights

1. Why don’t we start by talking about your current role.  What do you do for PPD on a daily basis?

 Sure. I’ll start by giving a bit further background on my company. 

PPD manages clinical research for pharma and medical device companies seeking to bring therapeutics to market, from small start-ups and biotechs to the largest pharma companies in the world. This includes clinical trial monitoring, conducting clinical trials, patient recruitment, laboratory testing, and post-approval/real-world evidence consulting services. We are a large organization of 21,000 employees in 48 countries. As you can imagine, this is a highly regulated industry, which is complex and evolving; to succeed in it, you must be analytical, collaborative, adaptable, and business savvy.  

At PPD, I’m responsible for managing global data protection compliance, specifically focusing on the U.S./North America, Latin America, and Europe. After being promoted to the Director level in 2017, I took on additional responsibility, and am now managing a team of three attorneys reporting to me, who are based in the U.S. and Spain.

My role involves monitoring legislative developments and building/maturing our global privacy program in response to those developments. I work closely with our Chief Privacy Officer, based in the UK, who has been working in the field for over 20 years. I develop policies/procedures, training programs, and guidance to ensure compliance with the challenging regulatory framework in this space, manage privacy-related M&A diligence, and manage other privacy-related issues, such as security incidents.

PPD also offers an EU Data Protection Representative Services to our clients, which is akin to a compliance-oriented consulting service to ensure compliance with EU privacy laws. My group spends quite a bit of time focused on this, and EU General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) related issues generally.

GDPR and global privacy law compliance has been a challenge for companies in our industry as well as industry wide. Suffice it to say, we’ve been very busy and there’s never a dull moment in this space.  

1. What do you like about your current job?

I enjoy working in a challenging field, collaborating with bright and dedicated colleagues throughout the world in a growing and highly successful company, and being focused on the mission of improving health and helping our clients to deliver life-changing therapies.

I also enjoy being a subject matter expert in a niche area, and the challenge of staying on top of an evolving regulatory environment.

I’m fortunate that I’m able to use my subject matter expertise to help solve complex legal, compliance, and business issues, and ultimately facilitate our mission of improving health while helping the company to operate in a compliant, successful, and ethical manner.

1. Why is privacy such an important issue to life sciences companies and companies in other industries as well?

The concepts of privacy and healthcare privacy in particular are not new, dating back as far as ancient times to the Hippocratic oath. What has changed over time, especially in the past 10 years, is that the regulatory framework in this space has rapidly evolving, in part in an attempt to keep up with the new technologies and greater uses of personal information.  

There are many reasons why privacy is so important for companies, the most obvious being the need to remain compliant with law and avoid significant fines and liability. Data breaches have been a major area of risk/liability for companies for many years, and the risk of resulting litigation and regulatory enforcement continues to increase. The EU GDPR brought this prominently to the attention of c-suites and boards of directors, given the potential for fines of up to 4% of global revenue.  

For many companies, it’s important to focus efforts on privacy to ensure customer trust and maintain a strong reputation from a PR perspective. Privacy-related issues, such as security breaches, tend to diminish consumer trust, company reputation and good will, so it is critical to invest in compliance and ensure a mature program is in place.  

1. What are some examples of challenging privacy issues you confront in your current job?

We face a number of challenging issues in our day to day work. Prior to the EU GDPR becoming effective on May 25, 2018, we spent many months preparing.

After May 25 came and went, there was a brief moment of respite, but we soon saw a new set of challenges in relation to other new laws enacted globally, including the recently enacted General Data Protection Law in Brazil and California Consumer Privacy Act of 2018 (effective January 2020). These laws have brought significant challenges, not only in matters of legal interpretation, but also simply due to the volume of work and resourcing (e.g., vendor diligence, contract review).

I also spend a lot of time on privacy/security diligence for M&A deals. I’m fortunate that PPD has grown through several strategic acquisitions over the past few years. These have been challenging from a resourcing and time-management perspective, but have been very interesting and rewarding experiences.  

1. What are some of the things you do beyond work to build your reputation as a subject matter expert?

I’m actively involved in groups and associations in both the privacy and pharma/clinical research fields, including the Association of Clinical Research Organizations (ACRO) and the International Association of Privacy Professionals (IAPP). I regularly publish articles and speak at events on privacy and data security developments.  

I obtained a certification in information privacy for the US in 2012 (CIPP/US), and for Europe in 2018. These have helped in terms of demonstrating the required subject matter expertise in this field.  

I’ll be speaking on a panel on the extraterritorial applicability of the GDPR—i.e., in what circumstances the law applies to U.S. companies and what they should do about that—at the IAPP Global Summit conference in early May, along with a good group of co-panelists: Ruby Zefo (CPO of Uber), Ed McNicholas (Sidley Austin), and Felicity Fisher (FieldFisher). This is a very important and challenging topic, which is relevant to many companies, so it should be interesting.   

1. What did you do when you were in private practice? Where did you work?

I started my legal career as a law clerk in the Connecticut Superior Court, working on behalf of a panel of judges. This was a great learning experience and transition from the academic environment of law school to the law firm world.

I was first exposed to data privacy/security law when practicing employment law at Skoler Abbott Presser, which is a boutique management-side employment law firm based in western Massachusetts, with a national practice. When the Massachusetts data security regulations (which were the strictest state regs imposing data security measures generally) were coming into effect back in 2009-2010, our clients had many questions on privacy/security compliance, and I quickly learned how to provide solid advice in this area, at a time when there was little guidance on interpretation for them.

I later practiced litigation defense with firms in Boston, but continued to hone my expertise in data privacy compliance, regularly publishing and speaking on the topic, until I ultimately made the transition to in-house privacy at PPD nearly 6 years ago in October 2013.  

1. How is your role now different than when you were in private practice?  How is the day to day rhythm different?

No billable hours—that about sums it up. But in all seriousness, in-house roles can be demanding and challenging just as law firm roles are. In private practice, you have the pressures brought on by billable hours as a young associate, and later, for business development. 

The day to day challenges when in-house in a global company include meeting time-sensitive business/legal objectives (e.g., urgent contract review and M&A deals), navigating the complexity of a highly matrixed corporate environment, and working with global colleagues (of different time zones and cultures), at times with limited resources. Work life balance and job security tend do to be better in-house.  

Which environment is preferred will depend on the person, but I think most, including myself, tend to prefer in-house. 

1. When you were thinking about making the transition to an in-house role, were you consciously thinking that privacy could be a good bridge?

Yes—I would say so. I was very interested in transitioning into the privacy field, and I knew that much of the challenging and interesting work in the privacy was being done inhouse (and this has turned out to be true), so this transition was ideal for me.  

1. Are there other skills you tried to develop while in private practice?

I practiced primarily litigation while in private practice, and I’ve found that the skills I learned have been very helpful inhouse as well. I do handle some litigation matters now, so these skills have been useful there, and are also helpful in evaluating legal risk/liability and making risk-based judgment calls on important issues.  

While in private practice, I was also involved in business development activities, including publishing articles on legal developments and speaking at seminars; these skills have also served me well in my career.  

1. When you were ready to make a move, how did you conduct your search?
   

Primarily online. Networking is certainly important in any job search for a number of reasons; you will gain valuable advice, meet professionals/contacts in your field, and it will help you to better understand your career goals and objectives. But, at least in my case, I found the position itself online and applied through that channel.  

Corey, we are just about out of time, are there any parting pearls of wisdom you’d like to share with our audience? 

Well, in terms of career advice, I would reiterate the common advice that hard work, dedication, and developing a focused area of interest in a marketable area are important. Research your areas of interest, network with professionals in those areas, and try to find a position where you’ll get some experience in your chosen field, over time building your resume, credentials, and reputation. 

The legal field has become more competitive in the last couple decades, so it’s important to find a marketable niche or focus on a growing industry. For me, developing a niche expertise in the growing areas of privacy and healthcare/pharma/clinical research has been useful in my career development. So, look for growing niche areas. 

Aside from that, a lawyer’s role as a business partner and consultant has become more important than in the past, so be prepared to demonstrate that you have not only analytical legal skills, but also can succeed in a business capacity.  

Corey, I want to thank you for taking the time to speak with me today.  If anyone in our audience has follow up questions, how can they reach you? 

Thank you Steve. I enjoyed the discussion with you today and hope it will be helpful to others. I’d be happy to address questions and can be reached at [email protected].  

This has been the CounseltoCounsel Podcast with Stephen Seckler.  We’ll be back soon with additional episodes to help you sort out your own career and marketing questions.

Until then, thank for listening and please feel free to reach out with any comments to [email protected] .  If you like this show, please review us on iTunes.

Launching your legal career at a large law firm has many advantages.  Aside from the obvious compensation benefits, large firms provide young associates with access to sophisticated work, more formalized training and a chance to serve large and complex clients.  But the path to partnership at a large firm remains long and challenging.  In fact partnership is not the goal for many associates who start their careers at an AmLaw100/200 law firm.

While there are many career paths after leaving a large firm, in-house counsel positions remain a favorite option.  Some associates move into governmental in-house roles while others move into corporate roles.

My guest, Raquel Webster, has tried both career paths.  She currently serves as Senior Counsel to National Grid, a gas and electric utility in New England.  She began her legal career as a litigation associate in the Boston office of Bingham McCutcheon (Bingham has since been acquired by Morgan Lewis and Bockius.)  From there she transitioned into a role in the law department of the City of Boston before moving into her current role.

Raquel is active in many non-profit causes and serves on several boards.  She was named as one of the 40 Under 40 by the Boston Business Journal several years ago, and she was just named as one of the 2018 Massachusetts Lawyer’s Weekly Top Women of the Law.

She has a lot of insight into how the role of in-house counsel differs from private practice.  She also has a lot of practical advice about how to pursue these coveted positions.

Other Resources

• What I’ve Learned As In-house Counsel
• In-House with Walt Pollard

Intergenerational conflict has been and will always be an issue in the workplace.  But as legal careers grow longer (many attorneys are working well into their 60’s and even into their 70’s), these issues become more pronounced. Simply put, law firms are now home to multiple generations of attorneys.  Similarly, with the explosion of digital communication in the last 2 decades, there are larger differences in how younger and older lawyers prefer to communicate.

In this episode, Kathleen Brady will be talking about how to navigate these differences.  If you are a millennial, what should you expect from your baby boomer bosses?  Where is the potential for conflict in how you communicate with partners at your firm.  If you are a senior partner, what do you need to know about the younger attorneys in your firm.  How can you establish better communication channels with this younger generation.

Kathleen Brady is Director of Coaching for Preferred Transition Resources in New York where she provides career transition counseling and outplacement coaching to attorneys.  She has 25 years of experience as a certified career/life management coach, author, and educator. Through her work, Kathleen helps lawyers identify and integrate their personal and professional goals.

Kathleen began her career counseling law students at two law schools and later, she was responsible for recruitment and professional development at several major law firms.

Kathleen is a past president of the National Association for Law Placement and a founding member of the NALP Foundation for Research and Education.

In addition to her work as a career counselor, Kathleen is an accomplished author and has published four books about career/life transitions including, GET A JOB! 10 Steps to Career Success (Motivational Press, 2015). She is a frequent speaker at the Association of the Bar of the City of New York, Pace Law School’s New Directions Program and the Leadership Council on Legal Diversity. Kathleen has also shared her expertise with Fox News, CNN, NPR, This Week in America, and First Business Report.

Thirty years ago, lateral partner movement was far less common in the legal profession. But today, it is not unusual to read about partners moving several times during their careers.

There are many factors which are fueling this trend.  First and foremost, law is a much more competitive business than it once was.  Firms looking to establish offices in new markets will often look to existing local talent to staff a new branch office.  In addition, pressure on bill rates have made it difficult for certain practice areas to be profitable in a large firm. This has made smaller firms more attractive to lawyers with certain practice expertise.  At the same time, law firms of all sizes have gotten more aggressive about trying to build their rosters of talent and clients.

If you are a partner at a major law firm, the chances are you are being approached by recruiters or by colleagues from other firms.  How should you evaluate these inquiries?  What are good reasons to consider a move and what are some of the practical considerations?

In this episode, I speak with Dan Binstock, a partner at the DC search firm, Garrison & Sisson.  He has an extensive track record of placing partners/practice groups and associates.  He has brokered some of the most significant lateral partner placements in the Washington, DC market.  Currently, he serves at the President of the National Association of Legal Search Consultants.

Dan was named by LawDragon as one of the Top 100 Legal Consultants and Strategists in 2017. Prior to becoming a legal recruiter in 2004, Dan practiced intellectual property law with Finnegan Henderson, a national intellectual property boutique based in Washington, DC.

Additional Resources

• The Attorney's Guide to Using (or Not Using) Legal Recruiters: Answers to Important Questions Most Attorneys Don't Know to Ask ... But Should (2015).- contact Dan Binstock to receive a free PDF of the book
• A Career Audit for Partners-Contact Stephen Seckler to received your free copy

In the last thirty years, the importance of marketing has grown significantly in the practice of law. For most lawyers in private practice, an ability to generate work is now a prerequisite for becoming a partner.  At the same time, the tools for building your reputation and cultivating business relationships have grown.

Selling legal services still requires you to develop a practice niche and building a network of clients who know, like and trust you. But social media has changed the way lawyers communicate with their networks.

On today’s show, Betsy Munnell talks about how to incorporate social media into your legal marketing. Betsy has decades of experience representing lending institutions, private equity funds and businesses in structuring sophisticated debt and equity financings.  More importantly she is an accomplished rainmaker who has spent the last 9 years coaching lawyers on how to be successful in building a law practice.

Betsy began her career as an associate at the Boston law firm Choate Hall and Stewart and then spent the bulk of her time practicing with the law firm Edwards Angell Palmer & Dodge (which has since become Locke Lord).  She was among the core group of “rainmakers” responsible for the growth of the Firm’s nationally recognized media and communications finance practice.  She was also one of the chief architects of her firm’s diversity program.  

In 2009, Betsy left the partnership to pursue her interest in coaching.  She works with attorneys at all stages of their careers and has extensive experience coaching female law students at Harvard, Boston College and Boston University on transitioning into large firm practice.  At Harvard, Betsy directs an intensive individual coaching program for a small group of women headed for large firm summer jobs who are selected from the Board of the Women’s Law Association. Betsy also serves on the Board of the American Bar Association’s Legal Career Central.

Betsy is a strong advocate for intensive training in business and financial skills and business generation for lawyers, particularly for associates who may otherwise advance to junior partnership under-equipped to manage critical relationships or generate revenue. She co-founded and teaches, with Matt Rubins, a former private equity fund manager, a one of a kind, case study driven business education program for law firm lawyers.

She is an avid participant in social media and someone who is extremely generous in promoting the work of other professionals through social media (including myself!)

As part of every coaching engagement, Betsy teaches her clients how to use online platforms --including LinkedIn and Twitter--to build network and brand and to develop lasting professional relationships. But she has an interesting approach that may appeal to those of you who are more leery of interacting and posting on social media.

Additional Resources

• Twitter for the Reluctant Lawyer
• Winning Social Media Networking Strategies to Land a Job or Gain New Clients (a webinar)
• The Time for LinkedIn Has Come. Really
• What do Blogging and Vegas Have in Common

At different stages in your legal career, the goals change.  As a new lawyer in private practice, you are learning about the practices and procedures in your law firm and the clients you are servicing.  Most importantly, you are learning how to represent clients in your practice area.  Your focus is on billable work and on providing excellent client service.

If you are on a positive career trajectory, as you get more senior you are getting more client contact and starting to supervise paralegals, secretaries and more junior associates.  By year 5, you are probably feeling some level of mastery of your subject matter. 

But as you look towards partnership in the future, your goals should be shifting.  Being a great lawyer is important if you want to advance at your firm; but in all likelihood, so is your ability to start generating work.

There are many ways to build your business.  You can visit my website for resources to help you in learning how to market legal services.  One thing that can really help is to come up with a business plan.

On today’s show, Larry Buchsbaum talks about how to create a business plan that can help you build your law practice.

Larry, who currently serves as Director of Business Development for the Boston law firm Prince Lobel, has over two decades of experience in working with professional services businesses.  He has worked with Big 4 accounting firms and mid-size law firms.

Larry is a results-oriented leader with a proven track record of advancing cross-selling and revenue generating initiatives, client relationship programs, attorney business development training and go-to-market strategies. A common thread running through his years of working in law firms, Big 4, national and smaller firms is a client-centric approach to client retention and growth.

In this episode, I speak with Charlie Lord, an attorney who has spent his entire career trying to solve environmental problems. Since graduating law school, Charlie has worked in the non-profit sector and more recently, in the the for profit space. While he is trained as a lawyer, Charlie has spent most of his career tackling environmental problems by creating organizations and companies that are working to address issues like environmental justice, greenhouse gases and a host of other environmental problems. His legal training helps him to achieve his objectives; but since clerking for the Appeals Court in DC, he has had an alternative legal career in the truest sense of the word.

When I decided to go to law school in the 1980s, I was very idealistic and wanted to use my law degree to have a positive impact on the world. As an undergraduate, I was involved in a lot of environmental and other progressive causes and I enrolled in law school at Northeastern with the intention of being involved as a community activist. While I still try to make a positive contribution to the legal profession, the idealism of my younger days took a different turn.

But Charlie Lord is someone who has held true to his values.

After law school, Charlie founded two social ventures including Alternatives for Community and Environment  which focuses on combating environmental blight in the inner city. After leaving ACE, he co-founded and ran the Urban Ecology Institute which worked on educating inner city youth about environmental issues.

For the past 10 years, Charlie has been working in the for profit sector to address environmental problems. Today, his is a principal of Renew Energy Partners  a company which invests in energy retrofits in commercial buildings to reduce energy costs and climate emissions.

In this episode, Charlie offers some great career advice for lawyers interested in doing environmental work.

Many lawyers are interested in transitioning to an in-house legal role. Right or wrong, the perception is that working in-house means  more control over your hours.  It also means you are not responsible for generating your own work. At the same time, in-house lawyers get to be part of the “team” and sit at the table with clients before critical business decisions are made.

In contrast, being in private practice gives you the chance to be more entrepreneurial and build your own business, even though it removes you from day to day contact with your clients.

But there is actually another model for practicing law. It is a hybrid role called outsourced counsel. As outsourced counsel, lawyers can work onsite with several clients at once. While outsourced counsel technically have their own law practices, they also have the benefit of “living with the clients they are serving.”

In this episode, I speak with Paul Cohen, who is currently Senior Counsel at Dassault Systemes. But for many years, Paul maintained a private practice where he worked as outsourced counsel to several technology companies. Paul has spent his entire legal career working for technology companies in Massachusetts. He has great insights into what it takes to be successful in this hybrid role.

Paul is happy to speak with you directly if you have questions about being an outsourced counsel.  He can be reached at [email protected] .

Additional Resources for In-House Legal Careers

• What I've Learned as In-house Counsel
• In-house With Walt Pollard
• A Critical Assessment of In-house Legal Careers
• Frequently Ask Questions About Going In-house          

In this episode, I speak with Lauren Stiller Rikleen. Lauren is a nationally recognized expert on developing a thriving, diverse and multi-generational workforce.

For as long as I’ve been a member of the bar, lawyers have been talking about the role of women in the practice of law. Today, we are hearing a lot of discussion about sexual harassment through the #metoo movement. Prominent men in all walks of professional life, including the law, have been forced out of positions of power.

At the same time, many state legislatures have been adopting pay equity statutes to prevent women from being being subjected to wage discrimination.

But are women advancing into leadership roles in the legal profession? If 50% of law school graduates are women, why aren’t we getting close to seeing 50% women in the partnership ranks of top law firms? What are the barriers to women achieving partnership and if you are a young associate, what can you do to overcome some of those hurdles?

My guest, Lauren Rikleen, has been thinking about these issues for three decades. In this episode, Lauren shares some great advice for women who are looking to advance into leadership ranks in the legal profession. While men can also benefit from her wisdom, today’s conversation is focused on helping women to find ways to move up in private practice as well as in corporate and government legal roles.

As President of the Rikleen Institute for Strategic Leadership, Lauren Rikleen speaks at conferences, retreats, and professional events, consults, and provides training programs focusing on: strengthening intergenerational relationships in the workplace; women’s leadership and advancement; and strategies for minimizing the impact of unconscious bias.

She is author of Ladder Down: Success Strategies For Lawyers From Women Who Will Be Hiring, Reviewing, And Promoting You; You Raised Us. Now Work With Us - Millennials, Career Success, and Building Strong Workplace Teams, and Ending the Gauntlet: Removing Barriers to Women’s Success in the Law. She has also authored more than 150 articles for publications around the country.

Lauren holds leadership roles in the American Bar Association and served as President of the Boston Bar Association where she established the Task Force on Professional Challenges and Family needs which produced a nationally recognized report on the costs of work-life imbalance in the law.

Lauren spent over 20 years as an environmental lawyer in private practice and when I first met her in the early 1990’s, she was an active speaker at Massachusetts Continuing Legal Education where I worked as a program attorney. I also had the privilege of serving with her on the Boston Bar Association’s Standing Committee on Work Life balance more than 15 years ago. She is someone who truly cares about workplace diversity and someone who has spent a tremendous amount of time thinking about ways to change the status quo in the law.

Please visit Lauren's website for more information about how to obtain her books and other publications.