General counsel must adopt a forward-looking approach to assessing and mitigating legal risk
In a 2010 paper, former General Electric general counsel Ben Heineman laid out a vision in which the “ideal of the modern general counsel… is an acute lawyer, a wise counsellor and company leader” and that the essence of filling this role “is to move beyond the first question: ‘is it legal?’ to the ultimate question: ‘is it right?’” He argues that the job “involves not just dealing with past problems, but charting future courses; not just playing defence, but playing offence”.
