Interview with Ken Crutchfield
T
oday’s General Counsel spoke to Ken Crutchfield, Vice President and General Manager of Wolters Kluwer Legal and Regulatory U.S. The Legal
Markets Group within Wolters Kluwer Legal & Regulatory U.S. provides legal professionals across a wide range of markets with expert content and analysis and leading workflow solutions. Ken is responsible for setting the vision and strategic approach with a focus on developing leading digital products. He brings three decades of experience to his role. Prior to joining Wolters Kluwer, he was the Senior Vice President & General Manager for the Bloomberg Tax Technology division of Bloomberg BNA. He also served in executive-level positions at organizations including Thomson Reuters and LexisNexis. Throughout his career, he has successfully led the growth of multiple businesses in varying industries, including tax & accounting and legal. In this interview, we focus on the rising concern about ESG matters, how they relate to corporate counsel, the biggest challenges and best practices.
Welcome, Ken. Let’s start off by having you define ESG matters, and then discuss the role corporate counsel usually play in a company’s ESG policies, compliance, and reporting. Absolutely. The concepts of ESG aren’t new; but, more recently, activist investors, interested customers and others have driven a lot of voluntary disclosures within certain industries, particularly where there is an environmental concern or other sensitivities. ESG stands for environmental, social and governance. Environmental is just that — dealing with climate change, greenhouse gas emissions, water usage, pollution and dumping, etc. Some
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companies look to have a net zero carbon footprint, for example. That’s not a requirement of law, but they are looking at how they manage their environmental footprint. You have other industries – energy companies, for example – that get scrutinized based upon their carbon footprint, and how they’re reducing the negative impact. Social is about ideas of social justice, diversity, equity and inclusion, where corporations have a degree of responsibility in terms of making the world a better place and making their company more equitable. This can go as far as product enhancements and policies governing supply chains. The intent is to ensure BACK TO CONTENTS
