About

Editor’s note: This interview was conducted prior to March 2020.

What are the most important transactions and litigations that you have been involved in during the last two years?

The last two years within the Alcon global organisation have been marked by tremendous change and growth. The most significant [transaction] has been my involvement in facilitating the Canadian component of the global spin transaction through which the pharmaceutical powerhouse Novartis spun off Alcon, and rendered it a standalone publicly traded company as of April 2019. Alcon is now the largest eye care device company in the world. As the general counsel of Alcon’s fourth largest market, I was not only involved in the managing the legal aspects of the transaction within the Canadian landscape, but also in facilitating a mind-set shift within the organisation, including initiating training on what it means to be part of a publicly traded company.

Another notable project I am currently involved is leading the implementation of a global contract management system for the entire Alcon organisation. This will cover the complete life-cycle of the company’s most important contracts.

How can in-house legal leaders successfully introduce and implement a culture within a legal department?

In-house legal leaders must clearly identify what they want their legal function to be defined by, and resultantly what culture they want to embed. As an example, I have coached my team in leading our legal and compliance function with the following approach: We will be proactive instead of reactive; we will be business partners instead of the police; and we will be collaborative instead of siloed.

With this approach, I have worked hard to instil a culture of transparency, collaboration and integrity. However, in order to bring this culture to fruition and generate trust in the legal and compliance function, it is crucial for the business to view their legal advisers as partners. This involves encouraging the business to involve legal early in concept meetings so we can find solutions instead of only identifying problems. Legal leaders need to proactively equip their business partners with the information they need to make informed decisions. It is a relationship of mutual respect. I have found that if I take time to understand the business rationale for a particular matter and provide advice that ultimately addresses such objectives even if in a different manner, my commercial colleagues will then also be receptive to the advice that I provide.

If you had to give advice to an aspiring in-house lawyer or general counsel what would it be and why?

I would tell [them] that since you have to live with the advice that you give, make sure your advice is provided from the perspective of a business partner and not just as a lawyer. A general counsel must also know when to draw a strict line and hold firm in a position. As such, an aspiring general counsel needs to be able to be comfortable in the uncomfortable.

What techniques do you use to provide commercially-focused advice to your company, and how do you communicate these to more junior lawyers in the team?

My business partners often want to understand why a proposal or project is not appropriate from a legal perspective, and in essence whether it is simply against internal policies but not necessarily “illegal”. I [therefore] adopt a smart risk-taking approach. This involves asking enough questions to fully understand the business’ request and then explaining any risks that I foresee, including strictly legal concerns, reputational risks and potential violations of company policies. I then identify the respective severity of these risks. I try to involve the business and junior members on my team in the decision-making process in order to empower them and encourage them to take accountability. Most importantly, I highlight that regardless of the type and severity of legal and/or compliance risk involved, we all need to be able to stand behind our decisions and programmes, especially if questioned or challenged by a regulator or competitor. This technique helps the business to take ownership for their decisions and to view their legal advisors as true partners.

FOCUS ON: LAW AND MEDICINE

I’ve always been interested in the intersection between law and medicine. When in private practice, aside from being a business law lawyer, I began to develop an expertise in health law and then when I decided to make the transition to an in-house legal career, I chose to join an organisation in the healthcare sector. Over the course of my legal career to date, I have learned a lot about the breadth of the health law discipline, and have learned to appreciate the intricacies of both the legal and medical professions.

I started at Alcon with an objective of developing more experience in health law. Along with furthering my expertise, to my pleasant surprise, I have also had the opportunity to become a more well-rounded and experienced lawyer overall. In fact, being a general counsel of a corporation is like being the one doctor responsible for all patients and healthcare needs at a single hospital. If there were such a thing as one doctor responsible for an entire hospital, that doctor would have to be a generalist, specialist, and leader. In particular, this general doctor would have to provide many different aspects of care, including primary care, in-patient care, fulfil operating room responsibilities, deal with emergency cases and oversee the governance of the hospital. This is analogous to what general counsel actually do on a day-to-day basis.

A general counsel must be able to address legal issues that touch upon many different areas of law – they need to know generally about all the types of legal matters a corporation faces. However, they must also have a specialisation in issue spotting, and be able to develop an expertise in industry-specific legal issues.

Being in-house has exposed me to the complexity of the inner workings of a business. The general counsel plays a very significant role in managing legal risk, moving initiatives forward and making smart decisions. However perhaps most significant, from my experience, is being an advocate for the positive health of the organisation, being its reputation and holding to its mission with integrity. In Alcon’s case, this mission includes helping patients see more brilliantly. This tremendous responsibility and the versatility involved in the role has proven to be far more rewarding for me personally then what I had initially expected.