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06 June 2025 / Kerry Phillip
Issue: 8119 / Categories: Features , Legal services , Career focus , Profession
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A GC’s guide to team optimisation: don’t wait, do it today, by Kerry Phillip
  • GCs and CLOs must evolve beyond traditional legal roles to lead tech-enabled, high-performance teams that deliver measurable business value.
  • Successful team transformation starts with data-driven discovery, strategic planning, and phased implementation, focusing on early wins and continuous improvement.
  • Tech adoption and clear service models help legal teams automate routine tasks, enabling them to focus on high-value, strategic work that drives businesses forward.

General Counsel (GCs) and Chief Legal Officers (CLOs) are almost without exception excellent at the ‘law’ and ‘managing risk’ parts of the role description—it’s why they got the job in the first place. But today, GCs must also run an efficient, tech-enabled, productive team that delivers, and can show it is delivering, value to the business. And for this, they have had no training.

I have always been interested in change, innovation and finding ways to accelerate, more so than in, say, the niceties of competition law or the technicalities of

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MOVERS & SHAKERS

Jurit LLP—Caroline Williams

Jurit LLP—Caroline Williams

Private wealth and tax team welcomes cross-border specialist as consultant

HFW—Simon Petch

HFW—Simon Petch

Global shipping practice expands with experienced ship finance partner hire

Freeths—Richard Lockhart

Freeths—Richard Lockhart

Infrastructure specialist joins as partner in Glasgow office

NEWS
Talk of a reserved ‘Welsh seat’ on the Supreme Court is misplaced. In NLJ this week, Professor Graham Zellick KC explains that the Constitutional Reform Act treats ‘England and Wales’ as one jurisdiction, with no statutory Welsh slot
The government’s plan to curb jury trials has sparked ‘jury furore’. Writing in NLJ this week, David Locke, partner at Hill Dickinson, says the rationale is ‘grossly inadequate’
A year after the $1.5bn Bybit heist, crypto fraud is booming—but so is recovery. Writing in NLJ this week, Neil Holloway, founder and CEO of M2 Recovery, warns that scams hit at least $14bn in 2025, fuelled by ‘pig butchering’ cons and AI deepfakes
After Woodcock confirmed no general duty to warn, debate turns to the criminal law. Writing in NLJ this week, Charles Davey of The Barrister Group urges revival of misprision or a modern equivalent
Family courts are tightening control of expert evidence. Writing in NLJ this week, Dr Chris Pamplin says there is ‘no automatic right’ to call experts; attendance must be ‘necessary in the interests of justice’ under FPR Pt 25
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