FEATURE
The Role of the GC: Q&A with Ira H. Raphaelson Kevin Bolan, a partner at White & Case LLP, recently discussed the role of the general counsel with his colleague Ira H. Raphaelson, who twice served as General Counsel of a public company.
As a General Counsel, what promotes successful risk management? Five concepts guided me when I was a general counsel. One, business judgments are for business people. Good lawyers try to help sharpen those judgments through risk management. Two, the medieval map of the “known” flat earth
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had dragons at the ends of the world. Good lawyers help business people avoid the dragons. Three, you need a seat at the table. If you don’t develop clients within your business — finding out what they do, asking questions about why they do it that way, and inviting them to ask you questions — then you can’t understand where the
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dragons are. Four, speak truth to power, but without a big audience. Advising the boss is different than challenging the boss. You have to want to do the job more than you want to keep it, even more so post-Sarbanes-Oxley. Five, risk management is art, not science. It is definitely more than some stoplight-colored flow chart. BACK TO CONTENTS
