Law.com reports
For the first full month of shelter-in-place and work-from-home orders for millions of U.S. residents, April saw significantly fewer general counsel announcements as companies navigate through the COVID-19 coronavirus crisis.
For the first full month of shelter-in-place and work-from-home orders for millions of U.S. residents, April saw significantly fewer general counsel announcements as companies navigate through the COVID-19 coronavirus crisis.
March had a healthy number of new top lawyers at the height of spring hiring, but most of those general counsel and chief legal officers received their job offers prior to the novel coronavirus pandemic that has spurred mandated social distancing orders across the country and hurt the year’s economic outlook for many businesses. While companies reel from the impact of COVID-19, many executives, including top lawyers, have been taking pay cuts to keep corporate operations afloat.
Corporate Counsel interviewed several top lawyers, such as the Kraken chief legal officer and the Cognizant Technology Solutions Corp. deputy general counsel, who discussed their challenges of stepping into their positions within the last month. The new Hanover Insurance Group Inc. GC transitioned into his role over the past few months that made moving operations to virtual seamless. Sempra Energy named two co-deputy GCs in place of its GC, who started last year, in what appeared to be a sudden departure amid the public health crisis.
A few notable moves include new GCs at crowdfunding platform Kickstarter, whose new GC comes from ride-hailing giant Uber Technologies Inc., and language app provider Duolingo Inc., which hired its first top lawyer. Kickstarter didn’t make a formal statement as the incoming GC made the announcement on LinkedIn, showing some companies may wait until operations return to a more normal pace to reveal their newest legal executives.
Other moves include the compliance arms at Comcast Corp. and Boeing Co. changing legal hands as companies pay close attention to that part of their legal departments during the pandemic to avoid any government trouble down the road. Government agencies such as the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission and New York State Department of Financial Services hired top lawyers with in-house federal experience.
Below are other top lawyer announcements that were made this month.
