Features Women in Law

By 2009, two years into her role as general counsel for Nestlé Dreyer’s Ice Cream/Nespresso USA, Rosanna Marrero Neagle felt as if things were beginning to settle. The flood of paperwork and internal policy tweaks stemming from the 2006 Dreyer’s acquisition had slowed to a manageable flow; the late hours and weekend work, replaced by […]

Catherine Ross had most bases covered in 1995 when preparing to interview at the Montreal law firm of Phillips & Vineberg for her post-graduate, pre-bar training, having just earned her degree from the University of Ottawa. For as Ross explains, she and her mother had gone shopping and bought a spiffy navy suit that called […]

For many of us, the long-running TV show “Law and Order” is merely a diversion; for the impressionable young Lele Modise, though, it was a window to a fascinating world. The South African native seemed born with a strong sense of justice, and was certain by age 12 that she would pursue law. Watching the […]

A generalist with a knack for adjusting to changes in the marketplace, Wylie Strout was putting both of those attributes into practice in early April, while taking time to chat with Vanguard. Her employer, the Long Beach, California-based Laserfiche, is noted for being ahead of the high-tech curve when it comes to providing the safe […]

With her crew’s interplanetary spacecraft safely landed, Tammy Brandt grabs a flashlight and points it towards the strange flora in front of her. A friendly-seeming amphibian—a kind of cat-frog hybrid—emerges from the shadows. Minutes later, a herd of massive dinosaurs passes by in the distance, right before a terrifying, toothed-and-clawed creature, eyes aglow and eager […]

Lily Tsen was drawn to medicine. Or so she thought. Tsen chuckles while recalling how she tortured herself with math and science as a University of Melbourne undergrad, while others recognized her potential in law, commerce and anthropology. Not too many years later, the woman who became the first general counsel for packaging giant Amcor […]

As a young girl growing up in a working-class home outside of Little Rock, Arkansas, Lori Burrows’ parents imbued her with a single, deeply-held belief: If you’ve been given much in life, you should give back even more. The words clearly stuck. From spending more than two years in the Peace Corps to a post-college […]

As she stared out at the sea of caps and gowns that made up the 2017 graduating class of the University of Alabama School of Law, Debbie Long wasn’t sure if what she was about to say would be remembered. After all, how many of us can recall what was said at our graduation? “I’ve […]

Throughout her first 17 years in the legal world, Stacey Hanna had been no stranger to the interview process. If anything, given her growing roles and titles, she’d become something of an ace. Only, it’s a bit different when the person across the desk has to decide not whether to hire you, but whether to […]

In retrospect it was a lucky break. Fresh out of the University of Miami School of Law in 1997, with a rich background in criminal justice, Sabiha Chunawala expected to be a prosecutor in Northern California, only to find that the district attorneys’ offices had a hiring freeze with no thaw imminent. But Chunawala, a […]