About

Alexander Steinbrecher has a highly important role to play in the strategic management of legal issues at Bombardier Transportation in addition to his more immediate responsibilities. As such, he is co-chair of the legal management office for the company’s legal teams for Central and Easter Europe, Russia and Israel, which has built multinational ‘expert groups for business-critical fields of law’. On top of this, Steinbrecher goes into the expanded role he has in regards to commercial negotiations for the company: ‘I have been tasked in the past year to lead negotiations beyond my legal role. Effectively, my task was to build the negotiation team around the issues at hand, lead the development of the negotiation strategy as well as the preparation and undertaking of the actual negotiations. Certainly it has been helpful that I am a trained mediator as this has helped me comprehend and deploy different negotiation styles’. Apart from his mediation skills, Steinbrecher is well recognised in the legal community for his expertise in commercial conflict management, arbitration and alternative dispute resolution. The trust that the company has not just in his legal abilities, but his broader business acumen, is highlighted elsewhere also. ‘The true game changer in my career as in-house counsel’, he explains, ‘came when I was asked to become a member of the board of directors at one of Bombardier Transportation’s legal entities. This is when you must prove to the business that your competence and capabilities go well beyond the law. This is a challenging, but highly rewarding task’. Meanwhile, Steinbrecher is sitting on the board of directors of three legal entities of Bombardier Transportation in Europe. He sums up his overall positive impact on the legal team succinctly: ‘I feel I have had a hand in re-defining the legal role; we are not advising the business, we are part of the business at Bombardier Transportation’.