Team size: 6

Can you tell us a little about your significant accomplishments over the last few years, as a team or by yourself?

I joined Vestas Wind Systems, the Danish wind energy giant, in 2007 to foster, support and facilitate the fast-path growth of the industry of renewables for the French market. In this ever-changing environment, my objective has primarily been to shape the French legal department as a genuine business enabler function.

When it comes to risk assessment – which obviously is an inherent part of the contract negotiation, the added value brought by the legal and contracting department cannot obviously be based on a simple risk avoidance approach. On the contrary, I consider that “if no risk, then no business”. It is the general counsel’s task to understand the underlying dimensions of the risks, to have it properly allocated and mitigated, and to help turn it into great commercial opportunities.

In that sense, I have taken responsibilities to overstep the mere legal dimension of the risks and to actively participate in defining and executing with my peers, the overall strategy of the company. I consider that the accomplishments I have had are dependent on a certain ability to hold a holistic business understanding and to convert knowledge into business value. After all this, Vestas has consolidated its position as a leader in France for Onshore Wind, and I have been asked to extend a similar approach to North and West Africa, as well as for certain large accounts of Vestas worldwide. More recently, I have taken on similar responsibilities for Offshore Wind in the SEMEA region, in addition to heading-up a team of great lawyers which is responsible for a region consisting of France, Italy, Greece, Cyprus, Turkey and Israel. I consider it a unique chance to be nourished daily with a such variety of customers, business stakeholders and legal frameworks. Continuous adaptation to cultural and country specifics is from my standpoint truly inspirational.

Have any recent political, economic or regulatory changes impacted your work or company? How are you dealing with this?

As said by Heraclitus, “the only constant is change”.

This was true before the recent changes that affected the world though the magnitude of such changes, together with the combination of post-Covid supply chain disruptions, major political crisis in Europe, the hike in the prices of raw materials and of international transportation, making it extremely challenging for any organisation to adapt. All functions in a company had to go through the materialisation of these risks combined altogether. Seen from a legal perspective, and especially from the position of general counsel, this has entailed more than ever great expectations from all business functions so that the legal function continues to create trustworthy intimacy with all company’s stakeholders, at all levels of the value chain. Those risks cannot be avoided but legal can help ensure those are mitigated in the best way possible, notably when it comes to the negotiation of contracts and their implementation.

All these unfortunate events have caused the legal function to help a corporate organisation even more and it has contributed to breaking silos and creating better efficiency between departments. When a risk occurs in procurement for instance, especially in the field of large-scale projects as we encounter in the wind industry, it doesn’t affect solely one department, it affects the entire value chain from sourcing, sales, to project construction. Legal is often the common denominator to the contractual solutions that any of these internal customers need to reflect to ensure that to the extent possible, projects are performed as anticipated.