About

Founded in Canada in 1976, information technology and business process services firm CGI Information Systems and Management Consultants has now become the country’s largest IT services provider. The company’s internal legal support in Canada comprises of eight lawyers, four non-lawyers, three contract specialists and one contracts director. Eric Notkin, vice president and general counsel for Canada, the US, UK and Asia Pacific, leads the in-house legal team at CGI. Additionally, reporting to Notkin are six senior legal counsel who are based in Australia, US, UK, and India, and oversee their respective legal teams spanning approximately 100 members in total. Within each jurisdiction there are lawyers and directors who follow a linear reporting structure, which Notkin identifies ‘promotes knowledge transfer, collaboration and workflow’. CGI’s Ontario, Montreal and Western-Province teams pool transactional skills and collaborate building and leveraging a strong shared-services. The Canadian teams have collaborated with the off-shore team in India and Australia, and CGI has recently added a commercial contracts team in the UK and a mature team in the US. Notkin identifies that his teams are, ‘focused on collaboration, responsive and practical advice while maintaining a service mind-set’.