Team size: Four

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?

One of the most significant, yet simple, improvements that we have implemented over the past years is the use of cloud-based workspace tools which have allowed us to streamline our communication and collaborate more efficiently as a team. The increased use of these tools was initially a necessity due to the restrictions imposed by the COVID 19 pandemic, but they have retained their importance in our daily work life afterwards.

The main advantage results from the fact that the coordination processes within the legal department and with ISPA’s director has been significantly simplified. It allowed us to track changes and collaborate on documents in real-time, which reduced the effort required to share and review documents, and the need for back-and-forth email communication. This ultimately allowed us to not only save a lot of time, but also made the entire collaboration process more transparent for everyone.

It has also allowed team members to work together seamlessly, regardless of their physical location, ensuring that the team operates efficiently even while working remotely.

Apart from legal matters, has the team worked on other company initiatives?

Aside from providing legal services to our member companies, ISPA’s legal team also has a strong focus on compliance. A good example is the ISPA GDPR Code of Conduct for Internet Service Providers that has been drafted by the ISPA legal team alongside member companies. It assists ISPs in data protection compliance by elaborating a common understanding of the sector-specific implementation of the requirements and obligations of the General Data Protection Regulation, while taking due account of the technical reality.

Our legal team’s activities go beyond pure legal and compliance matters. As a partner of the Safer Internet initiative, ISPA Austria has a strong focus on online safety and supporting children, adolescents, parents, and teachers with acquiring and further developing their digital competences. ISPA’s legal team contributes to the drafting process of relevant materials by providing not only legal expertise, but also practical advice, with the aim of empowering users in using digital media safely, competently, and responsibly – without the need for regulatory intervention.

Can you sum up the team culture/ethos in one sentence? 

ISPA’s legal team’s culture is centred around mutual respect, collaboration, and a shared aspiration for high-quality legal expertise – as well as a passion for innovation in order to best meet the interests of our members.

Our daily tasks include monitoring the legal and regulatory developments affecting our members and advocating on their behalf towards law and policymakers. We also provide hands-on legal expertise to our members on the implementation of relevant legal frameworks. Considering the vast variety of topics that we deal with daily, mutual respect and collaboration among team members is essential to provide the best service to our members, as one alone is unable to gather the relevant expertise in all relevant legal fields.

It also requires us to be able to put the legal requirements into plain language for non-lawyers, including being able to translate between legal requirements and the technical reality, which requires an affection for technology on top of our passion for law.

Finally, being active in the digital sector means we deal with a legal landscape that is in constant flux. Thus, our legal team must also show a strong innovative drive when it comes to consultations on new legal proposals, to avoid new laws that impair the economic future of our members.