Team size: Eight

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

Talent continues to be an area requiring much focus. Being a small in-house team in a founder-led Fintech company, we require a specific kind of lawyer to succeed in our tight-knit group. Our business moves rapidly as we constantly innovate and create new products, including being the first to market in new and niche areas. As the general counsel, I am always on the look-out for great talent that will add to our team, someone who is an exceptional lawyer with a commercial mindset, the ability to solve complex legal challenges in a commercial way and someone who can partner with stakeholders in the business to help drive our strategy. Plenti has a unique culture. It is a young and intelligent workforce comprised of driven people who like to have fun at work. I have many amazing women employed in my legal team at varying stages of their family journeys. Finding replacements for parental leave can be a challenging needle to thread, but one that is crucial to get right in our company.

Over the past 12 months, the legal talent market has been tight, with lawyers now having an opportunity to head overseas for the first time in years. This has created an extremely competitive market, so finding and retaining great talent has been and will continue to be an area of focus and challenge for me as the general counsel.

Looking forward, what technological advancements will impact the role of in-house legal teams in the future the most?

While the advancements in AI will be a crucial space to watch over the coming months and years, from my perspective, the advancements in technology, increased sophistication of threat actors, and growing ransomware attacks significantly impact the role of in-house legal teams. In-house teams are increasingly required to work closely with the technology team to ensure the company is sufficiently protected from attacks and has plans in place.

This is not a set-and-forget type arrangement; constant improvement, penetration testing and cybersecurity assessments must occur regularly. Excellent data privacy credentials are essential for customers to trust an organisation, particularly with the proposed wide-sweeping reforms to Privacy regulation in Australia that are currently being considered. An in-house legal team needs to ensure that protocols are in place to ensure sensitive information is handled and stored appropriately. With threat actors becoming more sophisticated, in-house legal teams must work closely with technology teams to stay one step ahead.

What would you say are the unique qualities required to be successful as an in-house lawyer in your industry?

Financial services is a heavily regulated industry with constantly evolving legislation, adding compliance costs to companies every year. To succeed as an in-house lawyer in financial services, specifically in a Fintech, you need to stay across the ever-changing regulatory landscape while ensuring that you can find pathways for your company to continue to innovate and execute its strategy. Being a technology-first company, we always look for ways to automate or improve processes so our team can focus on high-value strategic work. Fintech also move very quickly. To succeed in our industry, you need to grasp concepts quickly and then execute them in short time frames to deliver results.