What has been the number one challenge that has impacted you over the past year?

At the current company where I work (HotelRunner), we use a SaaS-enabled B2B Network. Similar to the previous year, requirements arising from data privacy and electronic communication have been challenging. Due diligence relating to the current service and products was conducted to analyse and implement revisions for compliance. However, regulations are still a barrier in terms of new services and products based on artificial intelligence.

In your opinion, what areas should in-house lawyers focus on over the next few years to prove value to their organisations in Türkiye?

It is obvious that the pandemic has changed the way of doing business. The impact of the economic difficulties and high inflation rates on all levels of both employee and employer has been also challenging. Among these pitfalls, I believe that it will not solely be about the work; contributions will focus on better and effective methods to implement strategy of the company, the use of more technology, collaboration between the colleagues, hiring intellectually developed individuals, and limiting employee turnover.

Could you share an example of a time when you came up with an innovation that improved how your legal team works and did not come at a large expense?

Our biggest innovations are mainly based around new products being launched by our local IT teams. In line with the requests of the sales teams together with the sale and pricing strategy of the company, services and products are developed. As the legal team, we have discovered that such products may not meet legislative requirements although they meet business expectations. Therefore, we created a checklist in order to analyse the scope and purpose of the new product, an aimed business model, an invoicing relationship, and potential business risks, together with the personal data (if any) and dataflow chart. This method has been quite functional and productive for product modelling, risk elimination and prevention of any time loss.