Features

The van pulls into the driveway at 8:00 a.m.—right on time. The driver then shuttles you to a clinic in your community. After a routine checkup, it’s time for lunch, followed by a few hours of bridge—all in the same facility. By 4:00 p.m., you’re back home getting ready for tonight’s family dinner. It’s a […]

Short of founding your own firm, being able to grow in tandem with a legal-backed institution—through all the triumphs and pitfalls that follow—is something of a rarity. Then again, there’s a lot about Vee Leonard’s story that seems unlikely. Married at 18, mother at 19, law degree some quarter-century later and myriad life trials, Vee […]

Veronica Torres has always wanted to be a lawyer who helps people, but it didn’t happen how she thought it would. When she was in law school, she worked in immigration law and with survivors of domestic violence, and while both areas were rewarding, she knew neither was the right fit. Nonetheless, the experiences confirmed […]

General counsels and chief legal officers often claim additional roles—executive vice president and corporate secretary being two of the most popular. Multiple titles sure look good on a letterhead or LinkedIn page, after all. It’s a club that Victor Manuel Manzano Macias, who helps oversee the Mexican operations of international tire heavyweight Pirelli, is proud […]

There are many areas in Victoria Beckman’s life where she’s broken the mold of expectation, like becoming a champion roller figure skater in her native Colombia. And becoming one of the first women from her country’s coffee belt to become a cybersecurity legal expert in the United States. Now working in Ohio, Beckman’s a co-chair […]

When a dialysis patient, who happened to be a veteran, was repeatedly left stranded at a clinic after his exhausting treatments, the manager was at a loss about what to do and turned to Victoria Labriola for help. The goal was to make sure this patient would no longer be left behind and could get […]

Epiphanies can strike at any time: in moments of peace or panic, on a living room recliner or streets half a world away. Victoria Newman’s came right in the middle of a Caesar salad. While attending a conference for general counsels in Naples, Florida, Newman had dinner with a longtime legal head at a Canadian […]

Vid Mohan-Ram views life through a “what if?” lens. What if I applied my PhD in genetics and molecular biology to perform fingerprinting and gene screening of purebred dogs? What if, as a lawyer, I helped streamline and simplify the complicated IP process? What if I used my breadth of experience to encourage others to […]

For Vincent Castiglione, work and winemaking—two lifelong passions—have much in common. Chief among them is the notion that, no matter how diligent you are, the results are out of your hands. Environmental factors, you might call them. In the case of Castiglione, among these outside forces was the sale of his most recent employer, Nautica—the […]

Vincent Gautier has an affinity for the word “empowerment.” The term comes up repeatedly in the veteran attorney’s interview with Vanguard—and for good reason. Gautier’s agenda involves not just building a legal team, but unlocking each member’s talents by emphasizing training and individual strengths, rather than limitations. “People should not be judged by their mistakes,” […]