Being a GC Means You're More Than a Lawyer; You're a Team Leader

Attorneys often focus on technical legal skill as the path to advancement in the corporate legal department. Yes, of course,  technical skills are important. But it's also important to remember that the general counsel position is also a leadership and management position, and the larger the company is, the larger the leadership and management role is too. A successful general counsel (or an aspiring general counsel) must be able to manage people, not just legal matters. In "3 key steps to navigating legal department politics: In-house friction is not good for the department, and it’s not good for the business either," Monica Zent of ZentLaw offers a breakdown of three key strategies to dealing with the internal conflicts and politics of running a legal department:

• Recognize when it's there

• Evaluate the situation

• Do something about it