Best Practices for a Legal Team of One: Part 1

Often the first in-house legal employee joins the company during rapid growth or when there’s a problem on the horizon. Whether you’re a fresh hire or have been operating as a one-person band for some time, it’s a difficult role to play. 

To bring value and build relationships across the company, solo general counsel (GCs) need a list of dos and don’ts. This two-part blog series will cover day-one tactics and long-term priorities across six focus areas for one-person legal teams. 

We’ll also include advice from Tim Parilla, LinkSquares’ Chief Legal Officer. Before joining LinkSquares, Tim spent seven years as GC at DraftKings, where he built the entire legal function from the ground up.

Understand Why You Were Hired

Don’t become overwhelmed by ambiguity around what “success” means. You’ve been hired, so your company knows having an in-house lawyer will add value. Now it’s your job to understand what that means. But how?

Ask your peers and leadership what a successful GC looks like and what they need from the person in this role – the early days are a great time to explore, uncover opportunities, and clarify expectations. 

Advice from Tim: “Drill past anything vague (e.g. - ‘We have contract concerns’) to define addressable issues. From there, identify what you can solve. Target easy, early wins because these provide credibility and support longer-term problem-solving.” 

Create a Proactive Plan 

Avoid the common pitfall of trying to do too much – and then getting nothing important done. Create a proactive plan, even if that plan ultimately changes. Reflect on what you (as a one-person legal team) can do for the company. 

Caution. Don’t create a list of everything you can do. Here’s where to start. 

• Take everything that has already been accomplished into account and get a handle on basic issues like understanding existing obligations and learning what operational risks exist in certain business relationships. 
• Understand existing software, tools, and applications, and gather insights into existing contracts to assess threats and areas of opportunity. 
• Then, categorize actions by return and time. 

Example: Consider an automated solution if you identify contract drafting process fixes as important. Alternately, if you need to streamline deal closing by coordinating with sales, consider a contract lifecycle management (CLM) tool that integrates with Customer Relationship Management (CRM) systems like Salesforce. These can deliver big returns in a reasonably short time. 

One in-house counsel shares that a bias to act –even if hesitant or risk-averse– is essential. “An unhelpful hangover from the days of being an associate is a mindset that says: ‘I’ll advise the client on the law, with caveats, and the client will then make a decision.’”

Advice from Tim: “Many things provide value, but not everything provides value at the same level or over the same time period. Look for high-impact, low-hours projects. Then, move to other important but not urgent activities that share value. Also, the business now looks to you for critical decisions. The best path to success is by asking insightful questions, learning the business top to bottom, and taking a position on issues (yes, especially ‘business’ issues).” 

Rebuild the Basics

As a one-person legal team, you will likely encounter weak internal documents and processes. That’s why the next step is crucial: rebuild the basics. You can’t fix everything, so focus on the fundamentals, suggests Sterling Miller, former GC at Marketo. At a minimum, this list should include:

• Updating basic documents, including articles of incorporation, by-laws, and LCC documents, as founders often prepare these using DIY forms or templates. 
• Cleaning up or preparing a cap table showing equity positions. “Particularly, because founders will care once they get diluted during financing.”
• Ensuring the right human resources policies are in place as “HR is often an afterthought at growth companies.”
• Preparing form agreements for common contracts – while installing a repeatable contracting process. 
• Getting ahead of data privacy and data security issues.
• Protecting IPs like trademarks, patents, copyrights, and trade secrets. “For many small companies, IP is the crown jewel, and if it gets improperly copied or stolen, then all the value of the company falls away.”

Advice from Tim:  “Focus on your project management and maintaining an organized legal function. For your contracts, create a single source of truth. For other matters, establish a working relationship with business stakeholders and get to know how they work best, and adapt your practices to enable them to work with you in a way that best suits them. You’re a service provider. Make it easy for them to get value out of you.”  

But wait, there’s more! Come back next week for the final three focus areas for one-person legal teams. Can’t wait? Download the full guide here.