About

The Bank of Ireland legal function, ultimately overseen by group general counsel Gabrielle Ryan, consists of one the most highly-respected legal teams in Ireland , providing a wide range of cutting-edge legal services to Bank of Ireland Group at a transformative time in the Group’s history. In the course of recent Group organisational design changes to optimally align service delivery to changing Group needs, all practising lawyers in the Group are now part of the Group Legal services team. Robert Owens, practice head for digital and customer experience, reported some of the key projects that his team has worked on over the last year. Firstly, the team has been heavily involved in the cross-divisional group wide programme to implement the general data protection regulation in the Bank of Ireland Group both from a technical and legal perspective. Secondly, a key function of the team is to act as a legal business partner to the Bank as part of its multi-year €1bn core banking system and technology transformation programme. A key member who has recently moved internally to join the team is Claire Walsh. She joined Bank of Ireland after a sterling private practice career at Arthur Cox. Owens identified that ‘Walsh has a deep understanding of the challenging regulated environment in which the retail division of Bank of Ireland operates. She delivers clear and easily digestible advice which assists in the smooth delivery of complex projects’. Owens continues to add that a key trend in financial services has been the digital revolution in retail banking. This together with an increasing focus on data and analytics has given rise to increased demands for agile and customer-focused legal advice and ongoing support with the digitalisation of the Bank’s products and services. In addition there is also a requirement to assist with interpreting and implementing regulation which was designed during the pre-digital era. As part of this work the innovation and customer experience team has collaborated with a range of other departments across the Bank of Ireland Group.