Speculating on who will succeed Colin Stretch as the next general counsel at Facebook is our idea of fun water cooler talk. Corporate Counsel quoted several law department focused legal recruiters for a public version of just that.
I am so enamored with this topic that I chose to elaborate on my opinion here: The Dream GC job.
We title my eNews column “Culture Fit” with intention. To me, what makes in-house recruiting so much more enjoyable versus law firm recruiting is that each company has truly unique qualities: different products, services, and cultures. And while I love all of it, I find myself particularly interested in companies that are run by their founders. I even pay attention to that dynamic when making personal stock choices. With obvious exceptions (yes, I lost money on Groupon to be sure), my investments in founder operated companies have far outperformed other investments. But I digress.
The takeaway here is that Culture Fit is not the same as Culture Change. Sometimes the latter is needed. But 100% of the time, CEOs want a general counsel (i.e. Consigliere!) who will align with his or her vision for the company. And when the CEO is also the company’s founder, then you can add bold typeface over 100%.
Evers Legal is not handling the Facebook search. It’s my ultimate “I wish,” as one downside of staying small and independent is that we lack the kind of contacts and high profile placement history that would allow us to get in the door and compete for it. So, I will watch this one from the sidelines. But it does motivate me to up our game so to speak. I am going after more GC-level work in 2019. Let’s see how David does versus Goliath. Stay tuned.
Wishing you all a very Happy Holiday season, Mike