What has been the number one challenge that has impacted you over the past year?

The major obstacle faced by the company over the past year has been the economic challenges in Türkiye.

As the legal and compliance director and a board member, my responsibility is to safeguard the company and take care of business and employee needs. All business functions were highly affected by the fluctuation in the market; plans and projects were changed due to the economic situation. As a result, immediate and practical legal solutions were needed. We did our best to adapt to the healthcare ecosystem and meet the new dynamics, supporting changing plans with clear suggestions. We worked together to act proactively, with full compliance and on time, which was really challenging. However, in the end, it was good to see that we still succeeded as a team.

In your opinion, what areas should in-house lawyers focus on over the next few years to prove value to their organisations in Türkiye?

I believe digitalisation is the most important area that we need to focus on. The legal and compliance department is an enabling function and aims to optimise business operations. This means we need to be agile, stay updated on digital trends and get aligned with all the technology in the world. Data privacy is an evolving and important part of digitalisation. We need to improve our approaches and knowledge in this regard.

Could you share an example of a time when you came up with an innovation that improved how your legal team works and did not come at a large expense?

I created a mechanism for business partners to follow up on the status of the agreements they own. We made a list of agreements with business owners and highlighted the key issues to be followed up in the agreements, such as termination clauses, renewal periods and pricing clauses. Then we adapted these items to the Smart Sheet system. Business owners became responsible for their agreements and were notified of the deadlines regarding the key issues. This really helped to define accountability in the company and positively impacted the workload of the legal team, increasing performance.