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

Last year was a challenging year not only for us as individuals, but for the world. The global impacts from the pandemic, the changing economy, high inflation, supply chain problems, manufacturing difficulties, and the Ukraine-Russia war are still being felt around the world. The impact of these global stressors remains a primary challenge for us.

In-house legal teams are the backbone of a company when it comes to protecting its people, resources, technology, values, culture, and reputation. Identifying and mitigating risk is only one focus of an in-house team. I think the more important priority is enabling the operations of a sustainable, ethical, and legally compliant organisation even in times of uncertainty. I think with our competent strategy and agile decision-making, we as a team are able to overcome challenging periods and actually benefit from them.

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

Traditional ways of lawyering do not suffice the way they used to. You need to be curious and have an external focus – there is no room for silo mentality. Besides possessing strong technical expertise, you need competencies across business, financial, and managerial operations. As in-house lawyers, we must put particular focus on enabling the business partners and leaders of our organisations to make strategic decisions.

While our work is already complex and demanding, it is fair to say it will continue to grow in complexity and will require more investment from us. Artificial intelligence is almost everywhere and is expected to produce further innovations that will aid the legal industry. As in-house lawyers, we need to stay on top of changes to the legal ecosystem, keep abreast of new legal technologies, and be ready to implement change across company operations, services, and products accordingly.

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?

While working for my previous company, I assessed the role of our team to identify where we could scale back work in certain areas to prioritise valuable time. I implemented a policy that standardised the contract drafting process and removed the legal team’s involvement in it, which gave us more time to focus on strategic projects that helped advance company goals.