How do you approach managing legal aspects during periods of instability or crises, and how does your legal strategy align with the broader business strategy to ensure the organisation’s resilience?  

Instability does not help the business as it creates uncertainty around investments, customers reduce their appetite to spend, decisions are taken with the fear of taking the wrong direction. On the other hand, instability and crises may open new opportunities.  

Pressure on the legal teams is higher during said periods as they must deal with unexpected events, identify their legal framework and understand how this is applicable to the business in which the company operates. Being proficient in industry-specific legal requirements is crucial as non-compliance can lead to substantial penalties and reputational damages, impacting business continuity significantly. 

My first area of focus during instability periods is therefore identify legal risks and ensure regulatory compliance.  

Once the legal risks have been identified and the path to follow to ensure regulatory compliance is clear, the legal function should focus on transparency and effective communication.  

Transparency, both internally and externally, to maintain the trust placed in the organisation from its employees, customers, suppliers and investors.  

Effective communication is vital. I believe this can be achieved by setting up clear protocols beforehand such as identifying key spokespersons, establishing channels for internal and external communications, and preparing pre-approved messages. 

What do you see as the major legal challenges for businesses in Italy over the next five years, and how are you preparing to address them?   

European regulatory pillars on environmental, social and governance (ESG) are expanding the responsibilities of companies.  

Geopolitical instability, trade and supply chain disruptions, climate change, diversity and inclusion are challenging the legal functions as they must drive their companies through the changes that ESG will have on operations.

I believe that a well-organised in-house legal department will find new ways to add value and derive opportunities from ESG and strengthen their connections with the C-level board. My approach will be for legal to work with other functions, such as finance, procurement, IT and HR to understand and manage ESG risks. The legal function can act as joiners of dots, helping to develop the right policies across functions and developing the governance frameworks to implement them.  

Further to ESG, the speed at which technology is growing and the impact of Artificial Intelligence will inevitably impact the business; actually, this is already happening.  

With respect to legal tech in general, the lawyer should no longer be measured on the time they spent in reviewing the contract or in drafting a defense statement, but rather in the value they gave to the company in reducing its liability exposure under a contract/ the liability that they imposed on the counterparty. This will be crucial for law firms as clients may challenge a time-based billing mechanism in the near future. 

Concerning intellectual property rights, who owns the copyright to content generated by AI? The AI developer, the user, or does the AI itself have any rights? With regards to privacy and data protection, AI systems require vast amounts of data. What about user consent, data protection and privacy? Given the often ‘black box’ nature of AI algorithms, transparency will be inevitably compromised somehow. AI systems can perpetuate and even amplify biases present in their training data and legal concerns are on discrimination and fairness – think for example AI systems used for pre-screening of candidates by an HR department. How am I preparing with respect to legal tech and AI? I am actually keeping a curious attitude toward everything that gravitates around these topics and sharing ideas and vision with my peers at conferences, events and virtual coffees.