Linda Friedman will be one of the panelists on “Guiding the Present, Shaping the Future: Developing Strategies to Build and Lead Law Departments” on Tuesday morning, Sept. 30.
In April 2005, Fujisawa’s parent and Yamanouchi Pharmaceutical Co., Ltd. merged, forming Astellas Pharma Inc. At that time, Linda became senior vice president of Astellas US. She is responsible for managing and overseeing legal (which includes risk management and information management), intellectual property, compliance and internal audit for the Americas Region. She is a member of the Astellas US Senior Management Committee and works closely with her colleagues around the world, especially in Japan and Europe.
She took a moment to answer a few of our questions about topics that will be discussed at the upcoming DLA Piper Global Women’s Leadership Summit.
What characteristics make a strong leader?
- Honesty/operating with integrity
- Passion/positive energy
- Ability to inspire and motivate
- Ability to effectively delegate
- Sense of humor
- Strong communication skills
- Creative and resourceful
- Proactive
- Owns mistakes
- Ability to build, retain and develop a strong team
- Strong interpersonal skills, relationship builder
- Confident, but humble
How can lawyers apply these skills in building, restructuring and maintaining an effective legal department?
To be effective, a legal department has to be a strong partner and closely integrated with the business. Legal members must understand the business to best serve their clients. They must build relationships with their client groups and seek feedback to continue to improve, grow and recalibrate as may be necessary. Lawyers need to be proactive and creative in addressing legal matters -- thinking outside the box, converting problems into opportunities and being dissatisfied with the status quo.
Generally, what advice would you give to a new GC stepping into a new legal department?
Don’t make changes right away. Listen and learn. Meet individually with each member of the legal department and assess strengths and areas of development. Meet with each of key stakeholders in the organization. Learn the business and benchmark with others in the industry.
What role do outside law firms play in helping develop and maintain best practices within your legal department?
We see outside lawyers as an extension of our department, reflecting our philosophy and approach to legal matters -- as partners. It is crucial that outside counsel understand the business and keep us apprised of trends and best practices. At times we use our outside counsel to help us benchmark industry trends, best practices and emerging themes. We also use law firm advisory boards to help us address certain issues. These ad boards are comprised of thought leaders from a number of firms and provide advice and counsel. This “virtual law firm” approach has been very effective and successful.