An interview with Giovanna Rosato, Head of Legal & Compliance at Danone in Italy.
What are the biggest external forces or trends currently shaping your role as General Counsel and how are you responding to them?
Trend #1 – The Head of Legal & Compliance as a Strategic Designer
In recent years, my role has changed profoundly. Not so much in the substance of the actions, but in the approach to people and issues. From guarantor of regulatory compliance to strategic partner to top management.
Today, my contribution is no longer limited to the legal field: it is increasingly requested when discussing reputation, sustainability, organisational culture, and risk management.
As Head of Legal and Compliance, I am increasingly at the heart of decision-making.
How am I responding to this evolution?
I have chosen to broaden my scope.
I have delved into topics such as ESG, crisis communication, and ethical governance.
I actively participate in strategic discussions, with the aim of building a solid bridge between legality and corporate value.
Today, more than ever, we need hybrid skills, a systemic vision, and proximity to the business.
The value of the legal function is measured by its ability to contribute to a sustainable, responsible, and long-term vision.
Trend #2 – Navigating Regulatory and Geopolitical Complexity
The regulatory environment in which we currently operate is anything but stable. It is dynamic, fragmented, and often unpredictable.
Added to this are geopolitical tensions, trade wars, and rapid political changes.
The result? An exponential increase in legal risk and the need to be not only up-to-date, but also ready to act with clarity and anticipation.
How am I responding to this complexity?
In addition to strengthening compliance intelligence systems, I am working to create a solid network between my team and business functions.
The goal that inspires me: anticipate needs, not chase them. Operate preventively, not reactively.
At the same time, I am promoting increasingly close collaboration with cross-functional teams – IS/IT, tax, HR, Finance – to offer integrated consulting capable of analysing risks from every angle.
From supply chain to data transfer, every interaction with international partners today requires a broad, systemic, and informed vision. Because in a rapidly changing world, legal resilience is built with collective intelligence and operational proximity.
Trend #3 – Artificial Intelligence: Between Acceleration and Responsibility
The adoption of AI – including GenAI – is rewriting the rules of the game, even for the legal and compliance function.
Contracts, data management, monitoring, risk assessment: everything is being transformed, streamlined, and simplified. But each acceleration brings with it new vulnerabilities.
Ethics, governance, legal responsibility: these are the new frontiers to be protected.
How am I approaching this transformation?
At the group level, policies, procedures, and guidelines have been introduced.
At the local level, I am contributing to their implementation, working closely with the IS/IT and HR teams to ensure that AI adoption is not only compliant, but also consistent with our values.
The real challenge?
It’s not just defining clear rules for investing in, managing, and governing new technologies.
It’s building robust processes that enable the informed use of AI, even within the legal and compliance function, without compromising its integrity.
Trend #4 – Efficiency and Digitalisation: The Legal Function as a Driver of Innovation
In recent years, one request has served as a common thread among all the others: do more…more speed, more efficiency, more transparency. With resources that often don’t grow at the same rate as expected.
How am I addressing this growing pressure?
I’ve chosen to simplify.
To review processes and approval flows, maintaining essential controls but eliminating redundancies. I’ve tried to integrate compliance workflows into the digital processes of business functions, calling for a taylorisation of company tools that has led to concrete results: fewer duplications, more automation, more time for strategically valuable activities.
But digitalisation isn’t enough. A cultural shift is needed. I’m working with my team to transform our approach, strengthen integration with other functions, and build a new identity: not just operational support, but a lever for innovation.
Because today, efficiency isn’t just a question of tools. It’s a choice of vision.
Trend #5 – Legal ROI: Measuring Value, Not Just Risk
Today, legal and compliance risk has become transversal.
It affects every function, every decision, every business process. The legal function is increasingly required to: (i) supervise executives and boards; (ii) ensure high standards on privacy, ESG, and antitrust; (iii) manage global litigation with vision and rigour.
But all this comes at a cost. And it must generate value.
This is why the topic of legal ROI has become central.
It’s not enough to adopt new technologies: we need to align them with processes, with people’s actual behaviour, and with corporate culture.
I’m working to build this alignment. Because the true return on investment is not measured solely in terms of productivity, but in the legal function’s ability to be a value enabler, not just a risk mitigator.
How are you balancing the increasing demands of legal risk management with the expectation to drive business value and strategic insight?
Balancing Risk and Value: The Strategic Mindset of the Legal Function
In an increasingly complex and interconnected environment, legal risk is no longer simply something to be contained. It is a lever to be understood, governed, and – when possible – transformed into value.
1. From gatekeeper to business enabler
I have chosen a proactive and integrated approach: I enter projects from the early stages, not only to identify risks, but to build legal solutions that enable innovation. My role is to facilitate, not to hold back.
2. Legal risk as a competitive lever
In sectors where trust is an asset, compliance can become a reputational advantage. I have worked to transform compliance into a clear message: transparency, ethics, and reliability.
3. Data and technology for faster decisions
I’m focusing on legal analytics tools and risk dashboards to provide management with timely, data-driven insights. Because today, speed of decision-making is a competitive advantage.
4. Shared risk culture
Risk is no longer just the responsibility of legal. I’m promoting a culture in which all functions recognize it, manage it, and share it. Because resilience is built together.
Today’s legal mindset? It’s not just what protects. It’s what creates value.
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?
“Don’t wait to be invited to the table – build your own.”
One of the most valuable lessons I’ve learned in my career is that the value of the legal and compliance function isn’t measured solely by the ability to manage risk, but by the willingness to anticipate it, interpret it, and transform it into strategic leverage.
At first, I tended to wait. Wait for the business to engage me, for the request to arrive, for a space to open up.
Then I realised: true impact is generated when the General Counsel or Head of Legal and Compliance stops being reactive and becomes an active part of the decision-making process. Not downstream, but upstream. Not just to say what can or can’t be done, but to help make courageous choices.
The advice I would give to a colleague today?
Don’t just protect the company. Help it grow, innovate, and build trust. And to do that, you need to be visible, accessible, and strategic. You need to be there first, not after.
Because today, legal leadership isn’t earned. It’s built.
