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CZ and Friends
CZ & Friends is a podcast about what it takes to lead and evolve legal in an era of exponential change. Hosted by Cecilia Ziniti, former General Counsel turned founder and CEO of GC AI, each episode features candid conversations with legal and business leaders who are building for scale, taking bold bets on technology, and leading with humanity. Whether you're a GC, operator, or in-house counsel, this podcast is your front-row seat to the future of legal.
CZ and Friends
Facts Don’t Lie: SEC Insights, AI Risk and Keeping Law Human with Rebecca Fike of Reed Smith
Chambers-ranked Reed Smith partner and former SEC Senior Counsel Rebecca Fike brings a decade of enforcement experience to this episode of CZ & Friends. Rebecca shares how major investigations really unfold, why “facts don’t lie,” and how companies can protect themselves with process, documentation, and thoughtful disclosure controls. She also breaks down the rise of AI-washing, emerging enforcement priorities, and the practical realities of governance.
Beyond the law, Rebecca shares about mentorship, Big Law careers, and navigating parenthood with clarity and intention. This is a masterclass in legal leadership - with heart, humor, and hard-won wisdom.
Follow Rebecca:
@Rebecca Fike on LinkedIn
Show notes:
- Rebecca’s path from Big Law to the SEC and back again
- What SEC investigators look for (and why documentation is your friend)
- “Scrapbooking the deal”: the surprising metaphor every GC should know
- How companies should think about disclosure controls, risk factors, and AI governance
- AI-washing and the real enforcement trends to watch
- The future of the billable hour and training the next generation of lawyers
- Why Rebecca is unabashedly pro–Big Law
- Building trust in crisis moments and the psychology of receiving an SEC subpoena
- Candid reflections on career, family, boundaries, and mentorship
- Fantasy novels, dragons, romance, and the importance of reading for joy
Follow us on all social platforms to get each new episode when it drops.
@Cecilia Ziniti on LinkedIn
@CeciliaZin on Twitter/X
@GC AI on LinkedIn
gc.ai website
Facts don't lie. And if you are diligent and can dig in, and you know, you're reading through emails and texts and looking at phone records and trading records and everything else, you start to build this three-dimensional story.
Cecilia Ziniti:Welcome back to CZ Friends, where we talk with legal leaders, technologists, and operators, building the future of legal and doing it with humanity. I'm your host, Cecilia Ziniti. Today's guest is Rebecca Feich, a chambers-ranked enforcement lawyer and partner at Reed Smith. Before going into private practice, she was 10 years as a senior counsel at the Securities and Exchange Commission, Reed, complete boss lady, who had subpoena power, issued thousands of subpoenas, and led major investigations that you've heard of into corporate disclosures, insider trading, whistleblower matters. If just if she was knocking at your door, it was generally not good news. But now she's in private practice. I have known Rebecca for literally um 18 years. She runs a blog called Lag Live that inspired me both to go to law school and that I could balance kids in a career in law. She's written continuously on that blog since 2005 and is just an incredible person that I it is is genuinely a friend I'm super excited to talk about with talk with today. Today, in terms of work, she helps companies and boards navigate enforcement risk, crisis response, and governance. And she's one of the most thoughtful voices out there on mentorship, big law, how AI is reshaping the profession. Um, if you have any questions about the Securities and Exchange Commission, I can think of no one better to ask them. So let's dive in. We're gonna talk today about learning, leading, keeping law human. We'll get into some things around kind of AI, around current enforcement priorities. And um I am just so delighted. Let's get into it. Rebecca, I'm glad you're here. Welcome to the show.
Rebecca Fike:Thank you so much. I'm so excited to be here.
Cecilia Ziniti:Awesome. So you spent a decade at the Securities and Exchange Commission before going back into private practice. What drew you to that kind of work in the first place?
Rebecca Fike:So I started out in private practice and I was quickly becoming a mid-level associate at a large law firm in Austin, Texas. And this was in, you know, the early or mid-2000s before Austin was quite the business powerhouse, I would say it is now. And I was kind of looking around and thinking, you know, where is my next work coming from? What am I learning? Who am I learning from? What do I really want to do? And at the time, I was starting to do more IP litigation just because that was busy in Austin. And you, as an associate, you do whatever needs to be done. And I was seeing that I was quickly becoming more and more knowledgeable in it. And that wasn't what I wanted to do. And I really wanted to do securities-based work. There wasn't a lot of that in Austin. There is a lot of that at the SEC. And so I applied for a position. I think I studied as hard for that interview as I did for the bar exam and got that job and moved my family, which was then two kids, to Fort Worth, Texas, where the SEC's regional office is.
Cecilia Ziniti:So you had some big cases at the SEC. Accounting restatements, fraud investigation, criminal actions. So two questions. One is, have you ever put someone in jail? And one is, what did that, what did what what what are the biggest learnings from that time? Yes.
Rebecca Fike:So I personally, as an SEC enforcement attorney, only have civil power. Um, it is limited, which my children were always very disappointed to learn that I wasn't as cool as it as it sounded. But I did work on several parallel criminal actions with the DOJ and yes, had multiple defendants who did um end up going to going to jail. Um, and worked with the F FBI and Postal Inspection Service as well when investigating those parallel criminal cases. Main takeaways from that job, I would say, is that you know, facts don't lie. And if you are diligent and can dig in and you know, you're reading through emails and texts and you're looking at phone records and trading records and everything else, you start to build this three-dimensional story. And that to me was the most fun part of the job. And honestly, what drew me to being a litigation associate in the first place was it's a story. You're building a story and then you're trying to figure out how to tell it.
Cecilia Ziniti:Facts don't lie statement. I think it's something that as lawyers, you know, it it's it's the literal truth, right? So people talk about I I had a post on LinkedIn this week where someone was citing the uh few good men line about you can't handle the truth, right? So, how does that, when you say facts don't lie, like what does that mean for how a company operates or how you advise, or like, you know, pretend that I'm a brand new associate working for you and you're kind of explaining this concept. What are you telling them?
Rebecca Fike:Great question. It's actually, as you were saying that, I'm like, it's a lot more nuanced than that because facts don't lie in that that is how they are viewed by other people, like the jury, judge, you know, other side. But facts as you read them in an email, a text message, or certainly a person's recollection, those lie all the time. And so one of the things I tell clients so much now is that like documentation and process are your friend. Like I understand the instinct sometimes to not write things down. And again, there's times maybe you shouldn't. But when someone is asking questions about a process that took place oftentimes years prior, when I'm speaking with clients, that they're not trying to commit fraud. They are trying to do the right thing. And when those steps they're taking, the conversations they're happening, the caution they are exercising, the different, you know, hoops they are thinking about, when those aren't captured, it can be hard to remember later. And now you might have a timeline that looks very fast, which sometimes is not a helpful fact. You might have very little that shows the deliberation that went into a decision. And now you have getting back to the facts, don't lie. You know, you might have a decision that at the time, you know, was the right decision and was deeply considered and thought about. But four years later, the only reason you're ever looking backwards is because something bad happened. So that decision maybe was the wrong one. So now having any kind of documentation and support around the process you went through is a good and helpful thing.
Cecilia Ziniti:You do that well. And were there cases at the SEC where you came in, you know, maybe guns blazing, something had happened, and then it turned out that that no, people were just trying to do the right thing. And and and what did they do?
Rebecca Fike:A lot of times that's when you get into the witness test testimony. So getting that, you know, three three-dimensional view, that isn't always possible, depending on one, someone, someone's memory. Sometimes facts about around that deliberation are privileged, which is challenging. But what's most helpful is is where you have, you know, agendas, you know, minutes, topics discuss, even if you don't get into the details of those. And again, there can be reasons not to do that, but showing one bullet point of, you know, discussion on timing, that is actually more than you sometimes see or often see looking back through documentation in what is always a busy and crazy time. And you're just trying to, you know, get the deal done and do the best job you can. And I find it's helpful to talk to clients, especially, you know, GCs, CCOs, heads of heads of business units of if you had to piece this back together, like if you're making a scrapbook of the deal, what do you have that is capturing these boring, you know, day-to-day things you are doing that is the support for how well you did your job. And it's okay if things go badly later, if you did your job along the way, you know, sometimes things happen, but how can you show that you did your job and you are keeping, you know, shareholders' interests at the center that you were thinking about the business in this, you know, multi-layered way? And I think it's surprising to people because oftentimes when I get a new matter and I'm talking to a client now that I'm on the defense side, and I'm like, okay, great, can you send me any notes on that or send me any emails on that? Send me any meeting invites around that. They are certain they have them and they go back and look, and they very often don't.
Cecilia Ziniti:The scrapbook of the deal is an incredible concept. So, what makes a great scrapbook? Like, I I I want to pull on this metaphor. Okay, and I know exactly what you're talking about. Company gets to be of any size and you hire employees, GCI, now we're at 30. And you know, we we're in situations where it's exactly right. I'm doing a million things. I don't think I appreciated before I was a CEO, just the absolute breadth of the job, which is like funny because I was a GC. But, anyways, that's that that that's where it's at. The thought of scrapbooking, I mean, it's just like parenting, like you don't have time to scrapbook. So, what makes a good scrapbook? How do you do it? And I could totally empathize with like, oh, I had notes on this. You go back to Slack, you don't. So, so tell us like put us in the moment. I'm a G C and it's like, all right, I'm gonna, I'm gonna do some scrapbooking to to thank myself later. What am I doing?
Rebecca Fike:What was the subject of a meeting that usually just says says meeting? And again, I understand I'm talking about a best case looking backwards and redoing it. And in the moment, that's probably not going to happen. But when you have, and this has happened, over a thousand meeting invites that say like meeting, we're now relying on you know, your memory and other people's memory and insinuations that can be gathered from, you know, emails going on at the same time. Because again, you're only looking back at a story when something has gone wrong. And that I think is such an important context because it's it's not that, you know, people are trying to tell a negative story. It's that let's say something happened, the deal busted, absolutely shattered to the floor. And it in hindsight, it's clear there were some bad decisions made that seemed good at the at the time. I mean, you know, meeting re-timing, announcement, announcement details. I mean, almost anything, including people in your discussions, thinking of processes, like early on, I think that's something that's very hard, especially for a newly public company, which is often who I'm representing. You know, you're going from this process where you're kind of throwing out press releases as a private entity whenever you think you need to. Well, now you need process and you need process before you think you need it. Who has to read it? Who is gonna sign off on it? How does that work? Is there an email showing it went to the GC's office, you know, and then that went back to the executives? You know, process and are really what protect you. And that's something I'm always trying to convey. I it sounds annoying and it sounds like you have this person, you know, usually the poor GC or CCO who's trying to get everyone to follow the process, but that process protects you. It shows that you were, you know, taking a deliberate approach to the things that you did. And business leaders are allowed to be wrong. You are allowed to mess up, you're allowed to have bad things happen. That doesn't mean there's any kind of, you know, fraud or you know, shareholder action that's gonna have anything successful. You just need you were doing your best, you're being deliberate, and you were, you know, caring for the company in a way that is pursuant to the duties that you owe it. And process is how you show that.
Cecilia Ziniti:So much wisdom there. So I remember so law school, the business judgment role. Is there anything you could say that's comforting to people? Like, you know, because I hear this and I'm like this, like, you know, super, super boss lady issuing subpoenas, you know, get working with the FBI, the all these things. And you're telling me process is good. So I hear that, but like, um what's the good news?
Rebecca Fike:The good news is that you you're allowed to get things wrong. Like you're allowed to be human. Um, you just need to act, you know, in the bad at the at the time people up the most. And this gets into the business judgment rule, is not having a good flow of information. You know, the CEO can't and shouldn't know everything, right? That's just not going to be a functional or organization. But there has to be, and again, I'm gonna say the word process, a thoughtful process in how information, especially bad information, the bad facts, bad sales, and unexpected number of returns of a product because they're not working that wasn't expected. Bad facts. There must be a process for them to get up to the decision makers to decide is this information that needs to get up to you know the C level suite and do those can't can those executives look at that information and decide if it's something that needs to be uh disclosed. But as a defense attorney, I am so much happier to see a very bad email have gone to the CEO or CFO and then decide this is not material, we don't need to disclose it than to find a very bad email that did not make their way up there because now I'm having to defend and say it's not material from this set-aside view, not from inside the organization. And I'm trying to explain why it's okay they didn't know about this. Much better if they knew about it and they, as experts in their organization, thought about this and made the decision that it's not material. That is now protected by the business judgment rule. You had process around that, you had disclosure controls and procedures that got potentially relevant information in there not to disclose it. What we don't want is finding these bad facts that got kind of stuck somewhere in the organization. We can still work with that, but it is easier if it is potentially material, if it got to the person who gets to decide that.
Cecilia Ziniti:Love that. I love that. For me, from the inside, the way I looked at this was so I I've said this before, I'll say it again. Amazon had an incredible legal department. And one of the things that I think made it so was the extreme customer obsession. And that showed up for us as product counsel. And like I had an incredibly good relationship with our the heads of customer support for the products that I worked on. And things bubbled up that way. And, you know, for example, I think Kamala Harris and This is Public, when she was the state AG, came after a bunch of app makers for essentially allowing children to run up charges in app stores. And Amazon was one of the defendants and did just fine. And part of the reason that there was some leniency or that that the case turned out the way it did was there was internal emails saying, hey, we're getting complaints about this all the time. What are we going to do about it? And you know, they still paid a fine. And, you know, there was, I still remember the famous thing was um, it was a Smurfs game. And there was a kid that had run up $800 worth of smurf smurf berries. And the question was, you know, do you refund it or not? And so it was kind of an interesting one. What's what's your story? I have to imagine 10 years of the SEC, is there some story you can tell us, some case? Um, maybe you had a real estate client or something like that. But I'd love to take that advice, which is incredible advice. Like you're getting free $1,800 an hour advice here on this quad folks, but I'd like to take that advice and make it real. What's the um what what what's a good story, or what what are you most proud of in your different enforcement actions you did?
Rebecca Fike:Yeah. So you mean from the SEC side or from the private practice side?
Cecilia Ziniti:Either either is okay, whatever you're more comfortable disclosing.
Rebecca Fike:So I had some on the SEC side that I am really proud of. I will say the ones I'm most proud of are the ones that were, I mean, I would say true fraud. It's it's not the case we're talking about of, you know, hindsight and trying to make sure everything's clear. I mean, there is fraud, and um, it's always very satisfying when you feel like you have found it and you know brought that to light and hopefully maybe got, you know, been able to get some money back to the victims of the fraud. In private practice, I mean, my best cases, which is a funny part of my practice, are secret because the SEC's investigations are not non-public. And if you can, you know, get their ans their questions answered and you know satisfy them that there was no, you know, fraud here or missteps or failures in controls, the matter's closed and no one ever has to know about it. You know, the irony being that's something obviously I would love my potential future clients to know about. So anytime you're talking about your you know, more public successes in private practice, you're talking about something where an action was brought. And sometimes, you know, that that is the result where you end up. But I did have, you know, a client who it was a priority of the current SEC, was looking at these whistleblower protection provisions. It was, you know, certainly a non-intent, no C enter, no fraud, but it was a violation of an SE SEC rule, or the SEC saw it that that way. And so there, your your goal is okay, if this is gonna be an action, our goal is to minimize the damage both reputationally, financially. And, you know, one of my goals always is look, if if we're coming to where we think there's gonna be an action here, let's stop spending money on the defense part, on the investigation part. You know, if you, the government, have already think you have what you need, then let's start talking about the result. Like let's jump ahead. We don't need to then spend one more year pulling documents, doing witness testimony. I mean, all of that is very expensive and it's an additional cost of whatever resolution you end up reaching. So let's just get there. And so in this one, we were able to negotiate in part because the client did such a good job, you know, cooperating, showing all the changes they'd made in their organization. You know, we had an extremely minimal fine based on the size of the company. And even better, you know, there were future cases on this topic, including one, I think a week later, that was, you know, many times many millions more, you know, than the fine that we were able to secure. So that's one where the client's still happy they have a case, you know, no, but it was a very good result. Uh yeah, yeah.
Cecilia Ziniti:So just to give you all an idea of scale, she's talking about a 50 plus billion dollar company, and the fine was in the very low six figures, which is like less than a one-month bill on a large patent matter. So yeah, and absolutely like, and this actually gets me to another topic here, so which is which is AI, right? So there's a lot of discussion. We see it among our 9950 customers of what's gonna happen to the billable hour. So I hear a story like Rebecca's, where yes, at the time she's billing $1,800 an hour. And I tell everybody that that asks, like, hey, what's the profession gonna look like? And I'm like, look, people like Rebecca, 10 years at the Securities Exchange Commission, knows the enforcement priorities, knows the attorneys, has seen, literally seen it all. She is the kind of expertise that does not AI does not replace that. So I so that's kind of our baseline. That being the case, Rebecca, what do you think? Where do you think the billable hour is going in that scenario? Because in this case, you delivered for this particular client, $50 billion company, fine in the low six figures, delivered an incredible amount of value. And for their future employees and the policies that they put in place and, you know, all the things we discussed. But how do you square that in a post-AI world? And and what are you, what are your priorities for your own practice?
Rebecca Fike:I wish I had an idea to replace the billable hour because I do, I do not like it. I do, well, I don't like it in that entering time is like the bane of my existence. And also in that I don't think it w it rewards the kind of like efficiency, creativity, you know, getting to the end of a problem that I think should be the motivator as defense counsel. And I think, you know, is all of us want to do our best for our clients, but we're literally paid by the hour. And so it would be nice if there was some kind of way to reward, you know, the idea or plan that works out that really is efficient and kind of jumps to the end. I don't know what that is. Um, in part because so many other factors are at play. You know, it's like you could maybe think of a success fee, but sometimes that's out of your hands too. You know, you're also you're dealing with a counterparty that you don't control. The thing that worries me about the billable hour is our junior associates. So I think for the for the partner, you know, you're bringing in, let's say, some a tax partner who knows an incredibly detailed part of tax law. He's almost $2,000 an hour, he bills one hour and gets you the advice that you need. That is still worth that is worth it. Because that $2,000 an hour, whatever it is, is built in, you know, hundreds of hours and years of experience and all the times you've read the tax code, the interpretation, you've applied it, like all that is in that hour. What worries me is the junior associates because they're not bringing as much to it. They they can't. They're coming out of law school, they know how to think. And then the rest of the time is learning how to be a lawyer and how to be practical and how to work with a client, how to work with another party, how to look at a pile, a massive pile of facts and documents and pull out what actually matters. And the only way to do that is practice. And the only way to do that is to watch it. And in our world, you're billing for all of that. And I do think that is hard. It's hard for me as a partner staffing junior associates. And I have found clients are willing to pay when you explain the value proposition. And so sometimes it's also just having kind of frank conversations with clients where, you know, I'll have a, you know, maybe a second year on a phone call with the client because that is more efficient than me after the phone call calling the second year, relaying what was said, talking it through. So you're now getting my time twice. Well, I'm more expensive. So it's really better if that that person is on the call. They're also learning. They're learning from the client. They're getting these facts directly. They're the ones in the documents, they're in the details, they are able to put things together. I cannot because I have read a fraction of the documents that they have. So that's my current workaround, but I I do worry about it.
Cecilia Ziniti:So when the clients want that efficiency, the cost transparency, are they asking for AI now? Yes. And how do you how do you address that? And are you are you using it? And then how are you helping train that second year?
Rebecca Fike:We certainly use like AI assisted review. So, you know, when we've got, you know, a whole bunch of documents that we are reviewing and whether we're responding to a subpoena, sometimes there it's still a little tricky because you have obligations under that subpoena to the government that, you know, you have taken certain steps to review and assess the doc document. So we have to kind of figure that out case by case. Where I think AI is particularly helpful is an internal investigation where the obligation is to the client that you are, you know, you're digging in and trying to find out, you know, what happened, if anything happened, is there any substance to allegations maybe someone has made? And an AI is is very useful there. And there, I think AI is great as long as a human is at the other end of it. So that's where, and that's where I talk to clients of, you know, yes, we can use AI to help us figure out what are, you know, helpful search terms, what is how are documents connected to one another? What is a timeline that could be pulled out of all of these facts? But then you need a person who has done investigations, who's talking to me, talking to others, you know, saying, You saw that, let's dig more there. Because there's a lot of things that don't seem prop problematic unless you've done a bunch of these investigations. And, you know, there's some threads to pull. So I I think you can hybrid that, but there's still, I do think, something a little bit lost in not just getting raw data and learning what actually leads somewhere and what doesn't.
Cecilia Ziniti:Talk about, let's go back to the SEC. I'm just fascinated. What's going on in regulatory now? Let's start with AI. So we've seen a couple of SEC enforcements around either AI risk or claims that companies are doing AI and they're not. So what um what's the takeaway? So a lot of us are GCs. Obviously, I'm, you know, running an AI company, so we've we've got our own jam, but most companies, whether it be manufacturing or retail or financial services or healthcare, are thinking about AI in their companies. Like that is a thing. I think I read something that like 50% of public company earnings calls had the word AI last year. Give us the regulator perspective as far as you know. And then I know Chair Gensler had talked about AI. What's the current regime thinking or regime? I don't know if you use that word, but anyway, administration thinking. Yeah. So what uh give us an insight into enforcement and AI. Two separate issues.
Rebecca Fike:So there's AI where companies are claiming they're using it where they aren't. AI right now is a buzzword. Customers, investors like it, especially those who don't understand it, but know it's something that's being talked about. And so therefore, a company that's using it is probably a good, you know, cutting edge, gonna do great things kind of company. So you're getting a lot of companies. I think AI washing is the phrase right now, kind of taken from the greenwashing when being environmentally conscious was cool. And so now AI is. And so they're saying, for example, there have been a couple SEC enforcement actions where like funds have said, oh, we're using AI to help us figure out the best stocks to put in here. And it turns out, no, they are not. It is still some people at a computer making those decisions. And that is just disclosure fraud. I mean, same thing with the ESG cases. Those were never a unique enforcement arm. It was just disclosure fraud. You can't say things that you're doing and not do them.
Cecilia Ziniti:I feel the same way about privacy. Like when privacy got hyper-technical, like, yes, of course, you know, GDPR and you need to comply. But the basics of do what you say, say what you do. This is like as in-house counsel, it's like in my toolkit. And I I felt that way about AI washing. And I think what what's, you know, I even talked about this in a GCAI perspective is like, we don't say, we do things that we don't. And that's just like it's it's just part of it. And I do think, again, I feel like an Amazon shell, but Amazon was big on this, where like that customer trust of like, you know, if you say it's gonna be delivered in two days, deliver it in two days. If it's not, you tell the customer, like this kind of thing. And so I think that makes sense from AI watching. Has the SEC abandoned kind of ESG at this point? Like, what should I be thinking about ESG as a general counsel or a CC?
Rebecca Fike:I mean, that I'm obviously not there right now, and most people who even are there are not working right now because the government has shut down. I would say the the the SEC's official stance is that ESG is not a priority right now. They disbanded the ESG task force. You know, my defense counsel position on that is kind of what I just said. ESG was never a unique facet or you know task of the SEC. It's disclosure fraud. Having false disclosures about your environmental impact, about your social commitments, about your governance, that's still just as problematic as it ever was. And I think if you know the current EC found clear misstatements in those areas, they would certainly consider bringing it and they would certainly investigate it because those aren't ESG cases. They're disclosure.
Cecilia Ziniti:Okay. So that's so AI washing category one. What's category two of kind of areas that regulators are?
Rebecca Fike:So I would say risk factors around AI. So companies are using it more and more and telling the truth about it. And so they're starting to put in AI risk, and that's great. It's great to disclose a risk. I think the next step though is how are you mitigating that risk? How are you talking about how you are mitigating that risk? And how are you thinking about your earn internal controls and your disclosure controls in light of AI risk? Because just disclosing a risk doesn't completely get you off the hook. It gets you a lot of the way there. It is very important to disclose potential risk. That said, if then you know something happens, you also have to look at the fact that because you're only asking questions when something bad has happened, you as CEO and CFO sign certifications with your own name that get filed with the SEC that say you have designed, implemented, and reviewed your disclosure controls and your internal controls over financial reporting and you have deemed them satisfactory. And so having the disclosure is great, but how are you then controlling for that risk? How are you thinking about that? How, you know, and and sometimes it takes a little while to figure that out, and that's fine. Part of evaluating is evaluating. So, you know, but once you start maybe seeing examples in other companies or, you know, you're seeing risks actually bear fruit, now it's okay, how are we working to prevent that risk? Or do we even have that particular risk? And you're continuing to both refine that risk factor on one end, and that's great, but you really want to be able to show that you are working on controlling for that risk on the inside. I love that.
Cecilia Ziniti:So again, I I think like for me, I came up, I did a lot of marketing compliance at Amazon, and it was like the substantiation and you know, even things like okay, the battery power, you know, the battery lasts three days or what have you. We always did a like we had tests. We literally had like scientists who do who tested this and we had the and we and we kept them on record and it gets back to your documentation point earlier. So I love it. I do, I do feel like with AI, there is, you know, it's obviously so new. And I do think it's changed the practice tremendously. And I've I've it's been, you know, the the job of a lifetime working on it. But I do feel like on the legal side, there's a lot of like what's old is new again, and and or you know, what's new is old again, whatever the expression is. But it feels like you you validated that. I love it. Um, all right. So you said before, let's switch gears a little bit and talk about kind of the the soft factors around being, you know, a very successful law firm lawyer, which you are. So you've said business development is personal. And, you know, you're obviously here on this pod. Hopefully, listeners can tell we're friends. You're not just like this hired gun. So, what does that look like? How do you develop a partnership like that?
Rebecca Fike:I mean, it's probably corny, but just genuinely day by day. I mean, I I really so when I first left private practice and went to the government, I wanted the expertise of the SEC and I wanted that kind of clear path for my future. But there's also a part of me that genuinely believed I would not want to be a partner in big law because I thought like having to sell myself would be terrible. Like that just made me so uncomfortable to even think about. And so I thought this was a way I could kind of not have to go out and find my work, um, which was true. But coming back to private practice, I mean, one of the most wonderful things I found about it is how personal it is. I mean, you are an advisor and a counselor, kind of in the highest sense. I think, especially in a practice like mine that often is, you know, crisis based. You know, if you're a GC and you get a subpoena from the SEC, that is a scary moment, no matter what the underlying facts are. It's a lot of un uncertainty, you're not sure what to do, you don't want to do anything wrong, you're concerned about this whole or organization that you're, you know, responsible for. And reacting in that way and that, okay, like I am here. I have knowledge that can help you. And, you know, talking and building that trust, learning about the organization. What are your biggest concerns? You know, what immediately came to mind when you received this subpoena? Like, let's talk all these things through. Cause what I have found is that a good 90% of the fears are actually something I can allay. Not all of them. And we've got to learn a lot of things. And that's something I have to tell clients too. Like part of my job is to put on my old hat and investigate you so that if there's anything to know, we know it before the government does. But a lot of the concerns are ones, you know, we can talk through and explain how the process works and, you know, make it feel a little more familiar. And in doing that, you build that relationship of trust that, you know, obviously my clients hope to never see me again. But if they needed me, you know, they would know I was there. But also, you know, people in their circle, in their contacts, do. And I do a lot of governance and advisory work that kind of that that does go go forward also.
Cecilia Ziniti:Love that. I love the like comfort. I mean, I have had, you know, for for me, we um, I think by the time this episode airs, it'll it'll be public that we uh that we recently used a funding round and I and I love it. And it and it and I'm so excited about the next phase, really excited about the investors that we're gonna have. But even notwithstanding that I've been a general counsel, I've done funding rounds as large as a billion dollars, and it's still like I don't know how I practiced for as long as I did, because it's still doing a disclosure schedule still makes me kind of nervous. Like, you know, we had we had an employee that that we that you know that that transitioned and there was a question about about that. And I I I got the email, it was exactly like you said, where it was like, ooh, you know, like this is like it just makes you nervous, even though we objectively had done nothing wrong. In fact, the employee left of their own accord. So it was like one of these things where it was like, and having in this case, the outside counsel that I spoke with, and it's obviously it's high stakes, right? So the SEC comes knocking, you're like, you're worried for your job, you're worried for your company, you're worried for your stakeholders, even if, in fact, like you said, in most of your cases, nothing happened. All right, so put us in the moments. Crisis comes, they get the subpoena from the SEC. Is it usually a phone call? Is the person nervous? Like, what are you, what, what are you doing? And then, like, obviously, you've built a successful practice, you've been very intentional about it. How do you make that transition from the like, hey, you got to tell me everything because I'm your friend? How do you how do you do that?
Rebecca Fike:I mean, that also takes takes time. And frankly, it usually takes a little bit of trial and error because even if someone truly wants to like unburden every potentially negative fact to you, they don't remember half of them. And or they don't remember what is otherwise extremely innocuous email that I am reading, pretending I am a still a staff attorney without context, you know, with a potentially like negative view, because I think something's happened. And then all of a sudden it looks different. So a lot of it just takes place over time. So at the start, it's I think really just assuring your client that you know what you're doing, right? Here is your experience, here's how these things have worked out in the past, and making sure from the beginning, this is important to me, that you give the entire spectrum of outcomes. I am optimistic. I do believe that we're gonna achieve, you know, a successful result. I don't know what successful looks like yet. And oftentimes neither does the client. I mean, that you're talking usually to the GC, maybe a member of the board, someone at the C suite level, they might not know there were some bad facts much further down in the organization. And so part of that is explaining that to them and explaining that this happens and that, you know, along the way we're gonna find things that maybe look bad. And then part of our job is getting the context around it, talking about, you know, is this something we bring to the government's attention on our own, especially if it's otherwise covered by the subpoena and they're getting it anyway? And provide the context around it in that moment. So they're not sitting on the document for months thinking they've got this slam slam dunk, and now you're trying to unconvince someone of something they think that's much harder than trying to set the stage kind of with the facts in the moment. But I just found it's communication, it's talking through things, it's being very practical and it's bringing up those practicalities. Like I understand your concern, this is going to be, you know, expensive. It is. But here's how we're gonna work on narrowing that. Here's how we're gonna start. And we'll only go out to these types of, you know, subjects if we have to. Here's just bringing them in the fold, because I think people can understand a lot once they're brought kind of inside and understanding what you're thinking about, and they know that you know, you're on their side and you have the same goals as them. And it's just taking it day by day.
Cecilia Ziniti:I love that. So you've said publicly that you're unabashedly pro big law. Now that's like, you know, I I actually loved my time at Big Law. Still, I I hired Morrison Forster, my outside counsel, where I'm an alum. I, you know, wearing the high heels and the big skyscraper and the like, you know, the like they're really doing this incredible analytical work. Like, I do think that like there's a lot of things to like about big law. Nevertheless, it is a contrarian opinion. It's an easy punching bag. What makes you unabashedly pro-big law?
Rebecca Fike:It is, I'm someone who I would still be in school if someone would pay me to be there. Um, I would love to just study new topics every couple of years, um, become an expert and then go study something else. And to me, big law is the best practical, profitable ability to do that. I think, you know, in-house counsel can handle an awful lot and do handle an awful lot of day-to-day matters. You are brought in, especially in my practice group, where, you know, I am the investigation or SEC defense counsel, you know, something really big has happened, something very hard has happened, something that they need that outside perspective on. And you get to dive in and literally get paid to dig into difficult facts, to, you know, complicated situations, a lot of people, you know, dates, things that happened, disclosures, the law, you know, and weaving all of that together along with the personal element of it, which is, you know, incredibly important and something you're also doing every single day. I think that is the best job. And I mean, I truly love what I do, but I also love that it for, and I have not ever been at a at a small firm. So that also may all apply. I just haven't experienced it. But also at a large firm, you know, done well. I think the mentorship and apprenticeship that can happen with associates is something I also love. I've benefited from that enormously as an associate in my early years, getting to watch other attorneys practice law. You know, there were maybe eight or nine partners in my practice group and all of them practice differently. And I practice differently from all of them. But phone calls, meetings, you know, just being copied on emails and seeing how they're, you know, writing to clients, to one another, to associates, absorbing all of that. And now, you know, getting to be part of that is something I really love.
Cecilia Ziniti:It's this thing where now as a CEO, I think about it of like, how do you get people doing what they love? And we've talked about it and you've written about on the blog. And I think you and I have a lot in common of just this like, I mean, I'll use the I'll use uh the word nerdy, nerdy kids that love to read it. So like I just loved it. Like I literally, like, I'll read this stuff for fun. And like at one point, I was doing very niche IP practice and like what does the word license mean? And like, you know, this like, and I feel like AI now it's like the Super Bowl for IP lawyers, and it's so fun. So yeah, no, that's great. I I think that's wonderful. And like, you know, if I'm if you're a younger associate reading this, go work for Rebecca because like, and that's what you want. It's like people that are genuinely at the top of their game. And that's the thing that's like been so fun for me from a management standpoint is like, how do you motivate people? How do you find what it is that they find most interesting? So they bring that joy to work and want to do more of it, like you just described. So yeah, I remember actually, uh, I'll tell a little story. I went to dinner with at Morrison Forester at the time, the co-chair of the firm. And it was, you know, the the bubble times. It was, let's say it was like, I think it would have been like eight, oh seven before the uh before the crash. And there was a group out of Stanford Law that made this petition that was like, we're gonna have fewer billable hours in big law. And at the time, I'm like, I'm savvy enough to know I ain't signing that. Like, what the hell? But anyway, it comes up, and the chair of Morrison Forrester, we were talking about it. I didn't bring it up because, you know, whatever. I was I was savvy enough not to do that. But another associate brings it up and he made this point that I remember, whatever, 18 years later. And he's like, what I think that doesn't realize is that when you're really good, your clients want more of you. And so, like, they want that counsel that you provided. So it does kind of to your point create this tension. And, you know, I think that like getting into work-life balance. So um, that's such a nice segue. So you've been a mom the entire time you've been a lawyer, and your family's always been part of the picture. I'm the same way. Disclosure, I literally found Rebecca's blog when I Googled, you know, can you be pregnant in law school? And she's still today. That is the query that lands people on her blog the most. Is that right, Rebecca?
Rebecca Fike:No, I mean, for then, I was pregnant in 2006 and 2007, but yes.
Cecilia Ziniti:Yeah, I mean, they didn't have, you know, TikToks and stuff about being pregnant or whatever. I don't think TikTok existed. But in any event, like this is literally like blogger. It is so good. But what has that taught you? Like, I mean, I have my own perspective. I could talk all day about it. But like having a family, and you know, you're you're I don't want to be sexist. Like, this is I would ask a dude this too. But the point is like, has it changed anything about your practice or like how have you done it? Because I frequently get people that are like, How do you do it? And I'm like, I you you just do. Like, like literally, that's my advice is like you just do. But what's your what what's your point of view?
Rebecca Fike:I mean, that's day to day, you just do it. But um, so yeah, I had my son in law school at University of Chicago between 2L and 3L. So I started, you know, big law practice with a one-year-old. And this was before, you know, remote work was really a thing. Video calls weren't a thing. You know, if you were calling in, sometimes you could kind of tell you weren't calling in from the firm system. But I always just approached it, I don't know, maybe I just didn't know any better. I just decided it was going to be fine. Like I was gonna be a great lawyer and I was also gonna go home and have dinner. And I definitely was at a firm and in an office. I was in Austin that was just always a little more flexible from the start. And that was definitely part of it. Um, I'm sure there are places where this would not have worked. But I found, at least in Austin, most people left, you know, by six anyway, or around then. And then you could just log back in at home. We didn't have as many calls from home as people do now, but I logged back in almost every night and would answer the last few emails that came through, or, you know, we had black blackberries then, mine was always out. Um, you know, I was still incredibly responsive. I don't think I ever had more than 10 minutes go without responding to an email, but I was home. And, you know, maybe I just wasn't important enough, but I wasn't getting emails every five minutes, like all night. There there were lulls and we would have dinner. We would, I would put him to bed. And, you know, he was one, he went to bed at like seven o'clock or something or 7:30. You know, I I now he's a teenager and goes to bed way after I do, but it it could work. And I built, you know, the reputation early on that I I did good work and I was responsive, you know, and even then in a very different environment, I really think that's mostly what partners were looking for. Like if I email you, do I know, can I trust that you'll read it and get back to me without me having to go back through my sent mail and try to figure out what I've sent out that hasn't come come back around? So that always worked. And I just I never could stay late. I mean, daycare closed. I couldn't go get like drinks with friends after work. And while I'm sure both of those things would have been nice, they weren't things I ever lost because I never had them. So when I had my daughter as a second-year associate, you know, it's kind of more of the same. And then I had my second daughter when I was at the SEC, and yeah, you just kind of keep filling it.
Cecilia Ziniti:It's like I almost hesitate. Like I had this in the screen in the script because I think you're you're you inspired me so much in this area. But the takeaway that I'm hearing is like all the reasons that you're a good lawyer is also the reasons that you're a good mom. And you can just do things. This is literally the thing that that is like an and I I would say even in my case, it inspired me also to be a CEO. It's like if I can juggle, you know, a bunch of kids and you know, big jobs, then then I can do anything. And like that ends up being the message for me. And I and so yeah, I love I love it. So check out our blog. It's at laglive, I think.com, L-A-G-L-I-V, or you can just Google it. Log spot. Let's go. All right, throw back to the early odds. Um, okay, so let's go. Let's do some quick takes. Um, so what's a book, principle, or habit that has shaped how you lead?
Rebecca Fike:I wish I'd read these. Um, so my only books that I read are like fantasy novels. So I can't, I mean, maybe I'm pulling.
Cecilia Ziniti:She has a great blog if you are into fantasy and romance. She does reviews, she's got recipes on the blog. Like Rebecca is one of the most real people I think you will interact with. Like the kind of the contrast of this like incredibly, you know, boss kind of like SEC, like, you know, you might get put in jail kind of day job. And the sort of like, you know, bodice ripping sort of romance novels that that she that she reads at night. It's like I just, I just love it. And people make fun of me too. I was reading uh sometimes I did a thing with The Economist. And yes, okay, I read The Economist, but you know, I I I I'll I'll pick up Us Weekly. I'll I'll get them both. And the lady at the airport store is like kind of looks at me funny, but you know what? It's fine. It's good, it's good.
Rebecca Fike:10K's a kids all day. I'm gonna read about dragons in my offline.
Cecilia Ziniti:Exactly, exactly. 2K's in the morning, dragons are nice, good. All right, so what's the piece of advice you'd give a lawyer that's starting out right now? Like so they're they're joining your they're joining your office or they're joining um, you know, applying as corporate counsel.
Rebecca Fike:Um think long term about your career. And I think this is very hard to do because when you're coming out of law school, you don't, you know, know how to be a lawyer, especially if you didn't grow up around one, as I did not. And so what I was thinking was important to me in a firm or a mentor very early on, um, I think, you know, I happened to find some good ones, but it wasn't because I knew what I was doing. Um and think about like how you want to practice, how you want to handle difficult situations, observe and soak up and be a sponge as much as possible. I mean, the one thing, so I've now been a lawyer for almost almost 20 years, things that I thought would never apply to me, or examples I thought I would never pull from. It's amazing how over time, this happens with parenting too. Um you think, oh, that won't ever apply to me, or like that story isn't gonna matter. And then like 15 years later, you've got a very different, you know, second kid from your first kid or, you know, whatever, and you're like, huh, I wonder if that would work here. Same, same thing with law. It's absorbing it all. And while I believe passionately that junior associates should get credit for like all work that they do, that they shouldn't have to, you know, be on client type, you know, calls and matters and not be billing for it. That said, if there's an opportunity to attend something, you're not gonna be able to bill it. If it's a partner you would admire, if it's someone who's really good at what they do, think long term and and watch it anyway, you know, be be part of it anyway. And in looking at a law firm, looking at just the junior associates isn't really what you're gonna be. You're an associate for eight to 10, maybe now 11 years. You're a partner if you stay in big law for 30. So look at the partnership. Look at what they are doing, who they are. Did they start there? Did they all come from somewhere else? You know, how do they think about the firm? What do they like about it? I mean, it's important to ask associates that because your day-to-day life matters. But again, that is such a small chapter in your professional book compared to the time that you are a partner or in in-house or doing whatever it is your goal is to do once you've learned how to be a lawyer.
Cecilia Ziniti:I use the metaphor of like I get people relatively frequently who are wanting to leave big law. And I say, you know, it's like orange juice. You just squeeze all the juice out of that. You know, and I had a mentor now, she's uh she's in-house at a at a big company, but she was a a partner at Morrison Forster for a long time. And she told me very early on, she said, you know, and this is the unsavory way to say it, although you said the very positive way, is like use the firm like the firm uses you. So like go to every event. You want to learn about cybersecurity, you go to the cybersecurity event because who knows 10 years when you're a GC, you're gonna have security reporting too. So, yeah, that's incredible advice. Any other parting thoughts for us, Rebecca?
Rebecca Fike:Made me think of her her advice was all I tell people, have certain, you know, boundaries that are really important to you and do not move them because the firm, and I've worked at two of them and I love them both, the firm does not care about whatever your boundary is the way that you do. In fact, they generally don't care at all. That's something that's important to you as a personal idea. Your job to explain or to make it important to them and then stand by it. But just as important, not everything can be critical and not everything can be a boundary. So when I think about, you know, like my work-life balance, such as it is, things really important to me, like attending, you know, events, being there for nightly dinner, that that just day-to-day downtime was so important. Going to my kids' field trips, I learned early on, I frankly don't care. I think I should care.
Cecilia Ziniti:I'm okay with that. I mean, also or like or like volunteering or like like cutting up papers or whatever. I'm like, can I just like give money? You know, in the one-on-one, like I love doing art with my kids. I was just like you, where I did not love doing art in a classroom setting. And so, like, you know, very similar. Exactly. All right. Well, hey, thank you so much. That was um, that was super fun, Rebecca.
Rebecca Fike:Thank you so much for having me.
Cecilia Ziniti:Awesome. That was my conversation with Rebecca Fike. So follow CZ and Friends wherever you get your podcast. Visit gc.ai to learn how legal teams are using AI, work smarter, lead with impact, and run into you know amazing advisors uh like Rebecca, who I hope if you ever need to hire her, she is at ReadSmith. If you have an SEC matter, she is without question the best. Um, so thank you so much for listening, and we'll see you next time.