General Counsel in the 21st Century

The role of general counsel and in-house lawyers is changing continually. Legal is now considered a vital component of leadership in most enterprises, and it is increasingly common for the GC to be called on for strategic input prior to important business decisions. Added to this is the convergence of social and political trends driving new demand for legal advice and service delivery; an increasing focus on productivity and efficiency; pressure to demonstrate the value of legal to the business in order to gain budget support; and the need to adapt and advance digitally.

The competencies required of the general counsel and their increasingly multi-disciplinary team are also growing with responsibilities expanding to encompass reputational risk, government relations, data privacy, ESG, and interacting with diverse stakeholders including regulators.

Edited by E. Leigh Dance and Christoph H. Vaagt, both with distinguished careers advising legal departments and teams for more than two decades, the second edition of General Counsel in the 21st Century offers general counsel and all in-house legal professionals a variety of expert perspectives on the evolution of the role of the GC and the corporate legal department.

Chapters are written by an international group of well-known general counsel, corporate legal leaders, and other experts, and cover important topics for general counsel today, including:
- The evolution of the general counsel’s role;
- Legal operations as a competitive advantage;
- How adaptive legal functions are embracing technology;
- Managing change in a legal department; and
- Doing more with less.

This title provides guidance on how legal departments can best support the businesses they serve, identify and address areas where change is necessary, and anticipate developments on the horizon. Readers - whether in-house counsel or private practitioners - will gather best practices and learn new and perhaps surprising lessons to help them succeed in their jobs as leaders at the intersection of law and business.