About

Being ‘heavily involved’ with each element of the business and having input into ‘all key decisions that the business makes, whether it is strategic, customer or employee related’, the BT Ireland legal team has six lawyers across Ireland to support the business, led by chief counsel Ruth Murphy. Focussed on being problem solvers, the tailored legal advice given in ‘business language’ distinguishes the legal team at BT Ireland as being excellent advisors able to support all aspects of BT’s Irish operations. The team has particular emphasis on commercial contracts, tenders and in-life contract management advice. Two important changes have been significant in their recent success and demonstrate their innovative approach. The team’s partnership with an outsourced legal technology provider and the introduction of a new process to collate data and key performance indicators have both delivered great results. The former is an internal structural change using a triage system for internal legal instructions, facilitating easier access to the legal team for the wider business, whilst the work with data succeeded in improving efficiencies and being able to guide strategic initiatives the legal team has embarked on. Further exemplifying the teams’ ability to work with their business partners, efforts were made to simplify contracts in style and substance, enabling transaction times to be sped up, and process management improved from initial stages to contract signature thanks to time tracking. Described as working with ‘agility and efficiency’ in order to meet their commitments to the business, this has meant keeping pace with the rapidly-evolving nature of technology and being on top of these developments. Such efforts are paying off as embracing technology has facilitated simplification and speed-up of governance and approvals processes using Sharepoint-based systems; meaning approvals can be given globally in minutes and can be accurately tracked too. The team enjoy very close relationships with their business colleagues, as well as ensuring they are up to date on legal issues they also ensure other teams at BT understand the importance of good governance and compliance. In addition to their sterling work in the Irish market, the team are full members of the wider BT Group legal which means they fill in resources gaps when necessary and apply their legal knowledge as part of specialist teams related to their areas of expertise. A business colleague captures the utility of the BT Ireland legal function, claiming that ‘it is no exaggeration to say that we could not run our business without the legal team’, and that they are ‘at the core of everything we do’.