How can in-house lawyers expand their influence

Mission Possible: Leading, Managing and Delivering
 

In this episode, Sarah Williamson, Partner and Head of Commercial & Technology at Boyes Turner, sits down with Sharon Evans, former Chief Legal Officer at TotallyMoney, to explore how in-house lawyers can expand their influence and demonstrate value within their organisations.

Sharon shares how meeting teams where they are joining stand-ups, using Slack instead of rigid forms, and speaking their language can help legal feel like part of the business, not apart from it. She also touches on how guiding colleagues through a crisis can build trust faster than anything else.

When it comes to senior stakeholders, Sharon explains how tailoring communication to the audience whether it’s the CEO, investors, or the board makes all the difference. Her advice on proving value? Don’t obsess over KPIs unless they truly fit your business. Sometimes, success is measured in the absence of friction and in spotting opportunities before anyone else, like getting ahead of GDPR or using AI responsibly.

A smart, practical conversation about influence, trust, and making legal a strategic partner at the table.

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Transcript

Setting The Challenge

Sarah Williamson 0:00

Hello everybody. So it's a pleasure to be here to host this session on a topic that I'm sure is probably one that you've thought a lot of. Um how as in-house senior lawyers can you expand your um influence, get your voice heard, and demonstrate your value to the business, whether that be to internal stakeholders, the C-suite, the board.

Meet The Hosts And Focus

Sarah Williamson 0:29

Hi, I'm Sarah Williamson, partner and head of the commercial and technology team at Boys Channel, and I'm joined by Sharon Evans, who's chief legal officer formerly at Totally Money. And we've been discussing the role of an in-house council and how they can expand their influence and demonstrate their value to the business.

Building Trust Across Teams

Sarah Williamson 0:49

So, Sharon, what are the ways in which you've worked with a business that you think have been successful and helped you to develop that relationship of trust?

Sharon Evans 0:58

Yeah, hi, thanks for having me. So I guess it depends which part of the business you're working with. I've taken different approaches with different teams and levels of the business. So, in terms of colleagues and getting people in the business, maybe working on products to really embrace legal, I found that the best way is to lean into the way that they work. It helps to build trust, it helps to kind of bond with people, and it shows that legal doesn't think that it's operating in a different, you know, galaxy to the rest of the world. You are therefore doing things like turning up to stand-ups, you're using Slack as a front door rather than legal forms. You're really just finding out what is the easiest way for people to interact with you. And I think that really does go a long way because you're trying to think through and design your processes to meet their needs. I also think that a good crisis can help, although you never really want it to happen in your organisation. If you've been through that with somebody, say a data issue or something that's very urgent and difficult and needs input from a lot of different stakeholders, if you can guide them through what is a really alarming situation for most people, then yeah, that that sort of personal relationship and trust that you develop from that is, you know, is really priceless, actually. And I guess what I'd say finally is when you're working with C-suite or the board, then it's obviously slightly different because you're not as hands-on and day-to-day with those people necessarily. So you bring something

Crisis As Credibility

Sharon Evans 2:32

different to those conversations. You want to provide them with the information they need to think about their three-year plan, their five-year plan, to make sure that investors have real kind of understanding of the horizon scanning for that business, that they understand what due diligence is going to look like if they're planning an exit, that you're just making sure that the ship is steady, you're a safe pair of hands, all the other, all the other sayings that we

Communicating With C‑Suite And Board

Sharon Evans 2:59

like to make about ourselves. Yeah.

Sarah Williamson 3:00

Yeah. And then just looking at the sort of the C-suite versus the board and how you communicate with them and deliver your legal advice and your advice on risks, how might that differ depending on who you're you're speaking to?

Sharon Evans 3:14

Yeah, I mean, in my most recent role, I was working with a board that had non-exec um plus founders, plus investors from private equity, plus exec directors, CEO, CFO. They all have really different kind of needs and wants from you because they all have different interests. I mean, for example, you know, working with a CEO, often it's the absence of friction, it's the absence of any kind of negative events that um you're judged on as a general counsel. Whereas, you know, an investor really will need particular information from you, um, perhaps external opinions, making sure that you really looked around the corner on particularly kind of like gnarly issues or things that they are concerned about would create a kind of theoretic, perhaps also just theoretical legal risks that could come upon due diligence or effect valuation down the line. Whereas theoretical legal risks ordinarily in day-to-day operations are not the sort of things that you want to be focused on because in the type of business I was working in, at least, you have a fairly broad risk appetite, and and that's that's not where you should put your effort. But I definitely found that I created really good relationships by trying to understand what each of those people would need from me.

Sarah Williamson 4:29

And how do you

Tailoring Advice To Stakeholder Needs

Sarah Williamson 4:31

go about demonstrating your value? So have you used metrics or KPIs at all, or is it simply a case of shouting about what you've done?

Sharon Evans 4:41

Yeah, probably in different roles and different types of organisation, I've seen different things. I think that where you have a business that's doing repeatable work, so perhaps like a strong sales-led organisation, KPIs can be really helpful in demonstrating just the volume of work that you have done and the speed at which you're doing it, your

Proving Value: KPIs Or Not

Sharon Evans 4:59

time to close deals, your time to market on stuff. That if you have the data month after month to make that meaningful, then that's great. And good luck and harness it and shout about it that way. When you work in a business that perhaps doesn't have that sort of really repeatable stuff, I think it can be a bit of a drain on time and energy to try and manufacture KPIs that end up being a bit ad hoc. And you really have to ask then, is that is that demonstrating value or does that actually make me look like the sort of person that thinks that this is a really good use of my time and my team's time? So certainly I've tried to make sure that instead that I avoid KPIs and that I demonstrate value through the absence of friction and sort of reminding people that sometimes if they're not hearing anything, that's also good. And to shout about the stuff that we've done that's really positive, um, to make sure that where we've had a win on a commercial contract by perhaps improving the commercials or improving payment terms or whatever, um, something that's not purely legal, that we that you champion your team for that and make sure that they are included in the thanks when the deal gets done.

Wins, Frictionless Service, And Timing

Sharon Evans 6:07

Also, if you see something coming around the corner, like GDPR was an old but once-in-a-generation example, to get in front of that and say to the business, look, the way we use data is gonna have to change. And I've got a plan, I've got an idea, and it's a great idea because we're gonna be able to monetize data in the way that we want to, but we do need to get in front of it and not leave it till the last minute. Those sorts of opportunities, don't let them pass you by because that's the that that's the time when you're really giving a solution to a problem and improving um the commercial arrangements for a business. If you can do that, then you should stand up and own it.

Sarah Williamson 6:48

And I think you've probably given them, there's a bit of a hook there, isn't

From GDPR To Monetising Data

Sarah Williamson 6:52

there, to reel them in where you talk about GDPR compliance, they've probably grown. But as soon as you start talking about monetizing data, that this will enable you to monetize data, then maybe their eyes open a little bit wider and you've caught their interest.

Market Context And AI Readiness

Sharon Evans 7:07

Exactly. And I think as well, if you understand the context that you're operating in, so you know the competitive environment, you know what other people are doing, you keep your networks strong, you keep your ear to the ground, you can go and add value by saying, I am almost certain that other businesses will be looking at things like this. I know that in the market, this is something that people are going to want, other people will find ways to do it. If we don't, we'll be left behind. I think a lot of those conversations are probably happening right now about AI and just getting ahead of using proper tooling and ways and the way that you do things to make sure that you're current and can and competitive. But um,

Hooks And Commercial Impact

Sharon Evans 7:44

yeah, you're right. You definitely need to find those hooks, find know your business well enough to know what advantage it can give them and then help them to realise that.

Closing Thoughts

Sarah Williamson 7:56

So thanks very much, Sharon, for joining us today. I think it's been a really interesting discussion.

Sharon Evans 8:01

Yeah, my pleasure. Thanks for having me.