“Legal teams, like any other part of the business, need to evolve, challenge inefficiencies, and lead change.”

An interview with Christian Fahey, Senior Managing Director, Deputy General Counsel (EMEA & APAC) at Ankura in UK.

What are the biggest external forces or trends currently shaping your role as General Counsel and how are you responding to them?

The two largest external forces shaping my role today are the rapidly evolving regulatory landscape and the disruptions and rapid pace of change that defines the modern business environment.

Ankura’s international business has been expanding rapidly across the EMEA and APAC regions requiring a thorough understanding of the different laws, regulations and market practices across a number of different legal systems (civil law, common law and sharia law) with each system having its own unique characteristics and principles. At the same time both the number and frequency of new laws continues to increase.

We also operate in a business environment experiencing increasing disruption from factors such as the interconnectedness of the global economy, technological advancements, shifts in global trade dynamics, and political upheavals.

Navigating these forces demands a legal function which operates as a strategic business partner aligned to the business’ changing needs which requires agility, adaptability, a commercial and problem-solving mindset, close collaboration and providing counsel with ethical judgement and integrity.

How are you balancing the increasing demands of legal risk management with the expectation to drive business value and strategic insight?

The management of risk is essential for any business to create and protect value, requiring a careful balanced approach between taking risks for positive results and reducing risks with negative effects.

Whether you are operating under a formal risk management framework or not, having a clear understanding of your business’ legal risks and its risk appetite is a fundamental place to start. From there you can focus your team’s limited resources on your primary risks, identify emerging risks, monitor changes to risk exposure and react appropriately.

In addition to this approach, we are also embedding legal counsel earlier in strategic decision-making processes, enabling us to spot potential issues before they become obstacles and to shape solutions that are both legally sound and commercially viable to help drive growth.

By being proactive, business-minded, and deeply aligned with company goals, we’re able to protect the enterprise while actively contributing to innovation and growth.

What’s one lesson or insight from your in-house journey that you wish you’d known earlier and would share with a fellow GC today?

I think encouraging your legal team to embrace innovation and proactively propose solutions to improve how the legal function operates presents a huge (often overlooked) opportunity. Much of a lawyer’s training focusses on risk avoidance, process adherence, following precedence and putting out fires. While there are good reasons for this, it’s also important to acknowledge that legal teams, like any other part of the business, need to evolve, challenge inefficiencies, and lead change.

Whether it’s adopting new technology, redesigning contract workflows, or rethinking how legal partners with the business, meaningful improvements often start with someone stepping forwards to take the lead. It’s easy to assume innovation belongs to other business functions, but legal is uniquely positioned to drive smarter, faster, and more resilient ways of working.

My advice to fellow GCs is to create a working environment where your team is encouraged to draw on their insights, be given time and opportunity to propose and introduce changes (with appropriate guardrails) and give comfort that they won’t be punished for failure.  

Innovation in legal doesn’t always require a massive overhaul, sometimes, small, incremental changes can have the biggest impact and that can come from anywhere in the legal team.