Krystal Kovac, Head of Legal & Compliance at Oncore, visits Technically Legal to share her story about building a legal department from the ground up.

Like many, Krystal decided to become a lawyer without a good understanding of all that entails. Also, like many, she didn’t like her first legal job that much, and when it ended, she went to Canada and became ski instructor. She also got another legal job in Canada that she actually liked, but her Visa ran out and she headed back home to Queensland.

When Krystal got back to Australia, she did a stint as a temporary attorney working for a tech company but ended up at Oncore for what was supposed to be a temporary gig helping the company clean up their contracting process.

Well…it turned out Krystal did such a good job, they asked her to be be general counsel and build out their legal and compliance functions.

Krystal explains that to build a legal department from the ground up, you need to first map out operational processes that touch legal. She says lawyers should also get out and talk to people to not only learn more about the company, but to actually build relationships.

Krystal also is a big proponent of meeting clients where they are, communicating with them via methods they already use and using tech that is accessible.