Features February 2019

Stephen L. Polozola’s wife used to tell him how happy he seemed upon changing careers, but he hasn’t heard that for quite a while. Maybe not since last year when he became the full-time general counsel and executive vice president at Urban Air Adventure Park’s headquarters in Bedford, Texas. A much distinguished construction and real […]

A teenager from a rural town kicked out of his home for coming out as gay. A trans employee fired from her job after management demanded she stop using the women’s bathroom. A mom in danger of losing custody because she’s a non-biological parent. Gennaro Savastano knows that many people who walk into one of […]

Do I want to be a doctor, or a lawyer? It’s a question many high-achieving students are forced to confront—including Samuel Vaisman. He may have only chosen one of these prestigious pursuits, but for Vaisman, it often feels like he’s practicing both. “Being a good general counsel is like being a good general practitioner,” explains […]

It almost seems too good to be true. There you are, a small business owner wondering how you’d ever double your microbrewery’s canning line, and up pops this website—something called Kabbage—offering small businesses access to working capital in minutes. There’s even an ROI calculator to help you zero in on the level of funding you […]

For Roch Vaillancourt, the whole thing felt surreal, even a little insane: trading a beautiful corner suite overlooking Lake Ontario’s boundless blue-gray waters, for a shared office half the size smack in the middle of a dusty construction site. Then again, the alternative had too much potential to pass up. Here, on a nondescript farm […]

Inspiration to pursue a legal career can come from the most unconventional means. For there was 8-year-old Yasmine S. Murray listening as adults bemoaned how reggae artists in their native St. Lucia were having their music pirated with no recourse. “That’s when I knew I was going to help people who were being taken advantage […]

She seems to have seen the writing on the wall years ago. The virtual wall, that is. For upon becoming one of General Electric’s general counsels at a new Nevada division in 2002, Tara Plimpton suspected that corporate legal departments would be under pressure to become more strategic and increase quality while, at the same […]

Kent Workman knew something about complex overhauls long before 2013 when he joined Coca-Cola Bottling Co. Consolidated (NASDAQ:  COKE) as its first lawyer. The name changed earlier this year to Coca-Cola Consolidated Inc., and the company has tripled its growth to become the soft drink’s largest U.S. bottler. Years earlier, as a young Navy officer, […]

When Holmes Lilley became executive vice president and general counsel at Chartwell Staffing Solutions in 2016, after “the longest job interview of my life,” he inherited a department that was spending well into seven figures on legal expenses. Even for a $350 million company, Lilley knew such outlays were unsustainable. Through a combination of tech […]

By all accounts, Robbi Nagel’s day begins like any in-house counsel’s might: checking email, planning work between the litany of conference calls and meetings and—most critical of all—that first cup of coffee. But it’s what Nagel toggles to next that lends her role a bit more color (and plenty of entertainment). As she clicks open […]