Pearls On, Gloves Off

On this episode, Scott Westfahl, Professor of Practice and Faculty Director of Executive Education at Harvard Law School, joins Mary to talk about his career journey since graduating from Harvard Law School in 1988, including his time at McKinsey and then at Goodwin Proctor before returning to Harvard where he occupies his current post. Scott talks about the importance of feedback for growth in the legal world which is something he learned from the consulting world. This can be either in the moment or at the end of a project, but he believes that feedback and extensive coaching are effective ways to create great leaders.  Scott takes us behind the scenes at the Executive Education program at Harvard Law which was launched in 2007 as a leadership development program for senior law firm executives.  He talks about his definition of adaptive leadership, a critical skill for legal leadership or legal ops professionals. He also dives into the ways law firms should be embracing experimentation and brainstorming.   Scott Westfahl - https://www.linkedin.com/in/scottwestfahl/ Harvard Law School - https://www.linkedin.com/school/harvard-law-school/     If you enjoyed today’s show, please leave a 5-star review. You can find more information, as well as the resources mentioned in this episode, at ironcladapp.com.     #LegalOps #LegalCareer  

On this episode, Lesley Garafola, Managing Director, Global Head of Procurement and Vendor Management at Barings, joins Mary to talk about her career history and how it led her to fall in love with procurement, much to her surprise. Lesley began her career at Wells Fargo as a paralegal, with the intention of going to law school. Then she started analyzing data and organically growing the operations side of the legal department and fell into legal ops. Now she heads up procurement, which she finds both fascinating and exciting. The biggest challenge she faced in her transition to procurement was learning how to handle the stakeholders. It takes strategic thinking — an approach she has now instilled in her team. Lesley was personally asked to join procurement. Despite her objections, she finally gave in and is thriving in her field. She takes us through the process and the improvements she and her team have made to the company’s systems and processes, building from the ground up. Lesley Garafola - https://www.linkedin.com/in/lesley-e-garafola-22146210/ Barings - https://www.linkedin.com/company/barings/ If you enjoyed today’s show, please leave a 5-star review. You can find more information, as well as the resources mentioned in this episode, at ironcladapp.com.     #LegalOps #LegalCareer

On this episode, Jill Kelley, VP of Legal Affairs at the New York Jets, joins Mary to talk about the many twists and turns in her career which eventually led to her position with the New York Jets. Something that might surprise people is just how small the legal department is at the Jets. It consists of Jill and a paralegal, so it’s a department of two. As Jill says, it is a highly visible and famous organization but, behind the scenes, the legal department is very much a mom-and-pop operation. Jill's day-to-day work focuses on the business aspect of the franchise. This includes revenue-generating activities like sponsorship agreements, suites and season ticket sales. She also works closely with the multimedia team on broadcast agreements and social media content. Jill talks about being a fan of using technology, usually for contract automation, even though it is a small department. As for the future, the league is focusing heavily on online sports betting, which means data privacy issues are becoming more important every year. Jill Kelley - https://www.linkedin.com/in/jill-kelley/ New York Jets - https://www.linkedin.com/company/newyorkjets/ If you enjoyed today’s show, please leave a 5-star review. You can find more information, as well as the resources mentioned in this episode, at ironcladapp.com. #LegalOps #LegalCareer

On this episode, Reese Arrowsmith, VP, Head of Legal Operations at Campbell Soup Company joins Mary to talk about his career in legal ops that started before legal ops existed. We talk about his time in early legal ops software, long before we called it legal ops. This included selling matter management software in the late 90s and early 2000s and building a system for The Home Depot in 2003 that integrated with the legal department. We also talk about the importance of collaboration and open communication in a legal ops department. This means everyone, from the top down, not being afraid to ask questions or suggest changes when something isn’t working. We also dove into his background as a consultant and the skills he picked up along the way. He says every experience in his varied background has helped him to get to where he is today. Reese Arrowsmith - https://www.linkedin.com/company/campbell-soup-company/ Campbell Soup Company - https://www.linkedin.com/company/campbell-soup-company/   If you enjoyed today’s show, please leave a 5-star review. You can find more information, as well as the resources mentioned in this episode, at ironcladapp.com.   https://ironcladapp.com/    #LegalOps #LegalCareer

On this episode, Lisa Mango, General Counsel at One Medical, joins Mary to talk about her career journey, through her move to the Bay Area for litigation work, which expanded into an in-house position, to her current role at One Medical today. Now, as a tech-enabled healthcare disruptor, Lisa has to pull on all her experience and knowledge just to deal with the regulations in healthcare that don’t apply to many non-regulated industries. She has done product work, privacy work, transactional law and has spent her whole career expanding her knowledge set as a means of professional development. For example, she did a stint in legal ops, which helped her learn to grow and scale legal departments and has been critical for her career. As she says, she can’t imagine being in her current role as a general counsel without her diverse legal experience. Lisa Mango - https://www.linkedin.com/in/lisamango/ One Medical - https://www.linkedin.com/company/one-medical-group/ If you enjoyed today’s show, please leave a 5-star review. You can find more information, as well as the resources mentioned in this episode, at ironcladapp.com. #LegalOps #LegalCareer

In this episode, Ryan Marks, Head of Legal at Airtable joins Mary to talk about all ways to create an efficient LegalOps department, the importance of data, and how to avoid the reputation as the “Department of No.” Ryan started his career in litigation, working on a variety of different cases over the course of several years. While doing this, he realized that instead of solving problems by working backward with litigation, he wanted to help clients use legal means to avoid those problems in the first place. As the first legal hire at Airtable, Ryan set out to use this approach to create a legal identity for the company from the ground up. He talks about how he and his team are careful to use all available tools to implement processes that will affect both internal and external stakeholders in a way that is comfortable and easy to understand. This approach maximizes growth while minimizing pain. Laying this foundational groundwork has paid off, as the company has grown from 200 to over 1,000 employees and his department has gone from a one-man show to a team of ten specialists. Resource: Ryan Marks: https://www.linkedin.com/in/ryan-marks-4100954b/ If you enjoyed today’s show, please leave a 5-star review. You can find more information, as well as the resources mentioned in this episode, at ironcladapp.com.   https://ironcladapp.com/    #LegalOps #LegalCareer

On this episode, Shana Simmons, General Counsel at Everlaw, joins Mary to talk about Shana's career journey. From how Shana got a job as a law firm associate in London to why she left that job and moved to California to work as a contract manager at Google. Shana waxes lyrical about her deep love for Google and what it was like to work at a company that was growing so rapidly. She also shares the tools and skills Shana learned at Google and why she didn't learn them as a lawyer, such as building and managing a diverse team. She then goes through how she worked her way up at Google, and why she ultimately left. Lastly, Shana goes into detail about why it's so important to hire talent that is different from you and how to manage them effectively as well as how to use technology to modernize legal operations. Resources: Shana Simmons: https://www.linkedin.com/in/shana-simmons-02295498/ Everlaw: https://www.linkedin.com/company/everlaw/   If you enjoyed today’s show, please leave a 5-star review. You can find more information, as well as the resources mentioned in this episode, at ironcladapp.com.   https://ironcladapp.com/    #LegalOps #LegalCareer

In this episode, Mary is joined by her friend Niki Armstrong, Chief Legal Officer & Corporate Secretary at Pure Storage, to talk about optimization and innovation in the legal ops space.   Niki has had a long and successful career, first as a lawyer and now as a CLO. She runs through her career and how she got to her current position. Then she and Mary walk down memory lane and talk about how their 20-year friendship started at a poorly put-together event in San Francisco.    Niki also recounts her time on Richard Branson’s short-lived reality show. She talks about the experience and what she learned from it before sinking her teeth into legal ops.    Niki is passionate about legal operations. She shares her approach to innovating processes, optimizing, and automating everything that can be automated while keeping the team on board and free from burnout.    If you enjoyed today’s show, please leave a 5-star review. You can find more information, as well as the resources mentioned in this episode, at ironcladapp.com.

In this episode, Mary is joined by Fergus Speight, General Counsel at Royal London, and Jenny Hacker, Head Of Operations - Legal & CoSec at Royal London, to talk about how they created and innovated a legal ops department before it was an established industry. Fergus explains how he started to see problems in the legal processes at Royal London but lacked the creative thinking to come up with innovative solutions. So he looked to his team and saw Jenny, who has a mind for innovation and the ability to bring ideas to life. Jenny discusses how she came up with ideas for change and how she and Fergus started legal ops in their company long before anyone knew what legal ops was. She explains how they went about making these changes and what they did to make sure that their whole team was on board. To finish off, the pair compare the legal ops industry and tech in the UK with that of the US. If you enjoyed today's show, please leave a 5-star review. You can find more information, as well as the resources mentioned in this episode, at www.ironcladapp.com.

In this episode, Mary is joined by Mark Ross, Principal and Co-Leader at Deloitte Legal Business Services, to discuss his impressive career and his best practices in the legal ops space.   Mark began his career in England as a personal injury lawyer before emigrating to the US. Here he started his career in legal ops to avoid taking the California Bar Exam. Since then, he has become a powerhouse in the industry.   Mark discusses his methods for convincing reluctant leadership to invest in the legal ops side of the business. He details the type of research needed, the information you need to gather, and how to present everything to leadership.    Mark also dives into the world of contracts, CLMs, and what can be done to help the contracting process run smoothly. He talks about why it is essential to get as much of it done in-house as possible since contracts are, in his words, touched by everyone and owned by no one.  If you enjoyed today’s show, please leave a 5-star review. You can find more information, as well as the resources mentioned in this episode, at ironcladapp.com.