About

After having spent seven years in private practice, mainly in commercial matters and mergers and acquisitions, Lionel Constantin joined JTI in Geneva in February 2007 as corporate secretary, where one nominator cites he ‘very quickly understands and analyses detailed relevant law and translates this analysis to the business needs of JTI’ by consistently impressing peers with his ‘professionalism, versatility, creativity and speed in which he finds solutions’. In November 2010, he took the position of assistant general counsel for global supply chain and in March 2013, JTI offered him the position of legal director for its worldwide duty free division. Being a legal director in a multi-jurisdictional market for the worldwide duty free department, Constantin has been tasked with a large number of marketing initiatives to review. After having discussions with the marketing team to re-assess the review process, Constantin explains, ‘we agreed on the level of risks we were all ready to take. On that basis, we could significantly streamline the review process of marketing activities, and save time that we could dedicate to other high level projects’. Looking at internal initiatives with the aim of strengthening the perception of legal within the business, Constantin has been behind a competition law workshop. The one-day workshop saw the legal team introduce cases to the sales force, followed by an interactive session where they discuss what could be done in a specific situation. ‘We noticed that this approach significantly improved the level of understanding of competition law matters by our sales forces and helps to better protect our company’, reveals Constantin. Taking pride in his role as a leader, he has led his team to ensure they have participated in and fully embrace legal department initiatives around making lawyers better business people, solution-orientated and bringing competitive advantage: ‘I strongly believe that creating a safe work environment is key if one wants employees to perform. I encourage my team to be curious, ask questions, to collect facts and not to assume anything’. He has continued to succeed at providing business sound solutions to colleagues. Following a large acquisition made by JTI, he was asked to change the board composition of 150+ entities spread around the globe in a short period of time. ‘This project was a great learning opportunity for me in terms of planning, prioritising and following up on progress. It also forced me to work on my listening skills as I had to understand clearly the local requirements before deciding on a step plan’, says Constantin.