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“With great power comes great responsibility.” — Voltaire, or, more recently, Peter Parker’s Uncle Ben in “Spider-Man.”
I should probably preface this post with an “unpopular opinion” alert because I am most likely in the minority on this one, but in my humble opinion, in-house counsel should find and use their voice for good.
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And what I mean by that is this: there is certainly nothing wrong with “clocking in, doing your job, and clocking out.” I know that our days can be long, and the dumpster fires are smoldering, merely waiting for a random accelerant.
At the same time, as in-house counsel, we have a unique opportunity (power admittedly is too strong a word, at least in my case) to lead in making our profession better, whether it is encouraging pro bono work, mentoring and sponsoring, moving the needle when it comes to diversity and inclusion, or championing mental health.
Let me be clear — I am not advocating anyone going rogue against their company policy and taking political stances or committing career suicide by engaging in community or social activism in lieu of their work. Rather, I just want to highlight, especially for those who haven’t thought about it before, how we as in-house counsel can have the ability to influence our partner law firms by sharing what is important to us and partnering with them on change-making initiatives, to the extent they are open.
While I get that our primary role as in-house counsel is to support the business and delving into other areas may be perceived as veering out of our lanes (depending upon the company culture), I submit to you that doing only our legal work and acting as an advice “drive-thru” seems like such a waste, a missed opportunity to do good, even in the smallest of ways.
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Thought leadership may seem a bit daunting — and certainly, there is a season for everything (I am a mom of two with a third on the way) — but is taking a phone call to mentor a young lawyer while you are in the carpool line that difficult? (Shoutout to Heather Stevenson, deputy general counsel of Boston Globe Media, for her #CarpoolCareerChats).
Is sending an email to your contacts at a law firm to congratulate them for giving billable credit for diversity and inclusion work too much? (Shoutout to K&L Gates!)
Is sharing a worthy nonprofit that your legal department has been supporting and highlighting the work on social media too extra? (Shoutout to Sheppard Mullin and the ABLE Project and Dykema and Promise of Justice Initiative!)
I don’t think so.
And if you agree, then let’s do more.
Let’s do more as in-house counsel, just because we can.
Meyling “Mey” Ly Ortiz is in-house at Toyota Motor North America. Her passions include mentoring, championing belonging, and a personal blog: TheMeybe.com. At home, you can find her doing her best to be a “fun” mom to a toddler and preschooler and chasing her best self on her Peloton. You can follow her on LinkedIn (https://www.linkedin.com/in/meybe/). And you knew this was coming: her opinions are hers alone.