Helena Kokot is the Director of the Legal Affairs Department at the Zagreb International Airport. She joined the ZIA in 2014 after 12 years in the telecommunications sector with Croatian Telecom and T-Mobile Croatia. She got her law degree from the Faculty of Law at the University of Zagreb in 1999.
Inside Insight: Interview with Jovan Velkovski, GC of JAT Tehnika
Jovan Velkovski is the Head of Legal at JAT (Yugoslav Airlines) Tehnika, an Aircraft Maintenance Repair & Overhaul Center in Belgrade. Prior to joining the company, he worked as a Senior Legal Advisor at Privredna Banka Beograd, where he gained professional experience in bankruptcy cases.
Inside Insight: Interview with Linda Szegvari, Chief Legal Counsel of MET Hungary
Linda Szegvari is the Chief Legal Counsel of MET Hungary, an energy trading company that was established in 2007. The company is a subsidiary of the MET Group, which is present in 28 markets.
Deal 5: Dr. Max Head of Group M&A Ivo Senkyrik on A&D Pharma Acquisition in Romania
On January 2, 2018, CEE Legal Matters reported that Czech pharmacy chain Dr. Max acquired the entire A&D Pharma network in Romania, in a transaction that has been shortlisted for CEE Deal of the Year 2017 in the country. While the transaction awaits approval from authorities, we reached out to Ivo Senkyrik, Head of Group M&A at Dr. Max, to find out how his team made the deal happen.
Inside Insight: Interview with Basak Gurbuz of The Walt Disney Company Turkiye
Basak Gurbuz is Counsel with The Walt Disney Company in Turkey, a company she joined in August 2015. Before going in-house, she worked for eight years at Gun + Partners and another year and a half at Pekin & Bayar.
CMS Poland's Man With Two Hats: Interview with Partner Andrzej Posniak About His Unique Dual Role
Andrzej Posniak started his career in law at CMS in 2003 as a corporate trainee and, step by step, become a qualified tax advisor, then a Partner and Head of the Tax Team in CMS Warsaw's Corporate Department. In addition, Andrzej also fulfills General Counsel and Risk Manager roles for the firm in Poland. CEE Legal Matters sat down with Andrzej to learn more about his unique role.
Inside Insight: Interview with Peter Paroczi of Harman International
Hungarian lawyer Peter Paroczi is the Director Counsel at Harman International, the US-based consumer electronics company. He joined Harman in Budapest earlier this year, after spending four years in private practice and then another seven in-house, first with Samsung Electronics, then at E.On. He agreed to answer some of our questions about his career.
Inside Insight: A CLO Reflects on Challenges on the Horizon
In the modern world, people are regularly faced with new challenges.
Face-to-Face: Alina Popescu and Gelu Maravela of Maravela & Asociatii and Mihaela Popescu of Mercedes-Benz Financial Services
Who knows lawyers better than other lawyers? In this issue’s Face-to-Face feature, Maravela & Asociatii Partners Gelu Maravela and Alina Popescu interview Mihaela Popescu, the former Head of Legal at Mercedes-Benz Financial Services.
Face-to-Face: Jan Myska and Petr Syrovatko of Wolf Theiss and Edit Rosta of 3M
Who knows more about lawyers than other lawyers? In the Face-to-Face feature, we step back and allow private practitioners to sit down directly with in-house counsel to discuss their challenges, strategies, and solutions.
The Future is Almost Here: Are We Ready?
Even though we have not yet reached the speed of light, the future is almost here.
Sailing Through a Rough Economy: An Opportunity to Shape the Future of Legal Services
In a challenging economy, in-house lawyers face higher expectations from their clients. On one hand, legal costs are usually seen by businesses as a strong candidate for potential savings. With that in mind, in-house counsels must navigate budget limitations through different measures, including curbing external spend.
Being a General Counsel During a State of Emergency
After the failed military coup in Turkey on July 15th, 2016, The Council of Ministers of Turkey declared a State of Emergency (SoE) in the country. This article focuses on the position of a GC when suddenly confronted with a SoE, needing to ensure the transformation of the company to ensure compliance with the SoE regime.
How to Prepare Yourself as the Head of a Legal Department for the Rapidly Changing World
Changes: Politics and Economy
Our world is changing in front of our eyes. The political situation seems to those of us living in developed countries as experiencing the most rapid changes since the fall of communism.
The Nightmare of In-house Counsel: Cost Cutting
Regulating an effective budget for a legal department is a major strategic decision that must be considered by companies and their legal counsel.
A Better Way to Cut Legal Costs
Legal fees are a necessary business expense in every company. The eternal feud between the legal and the financial departments in regard to the “unnecessary” external legal expenses seems to be the daily bread of every general counsel. The fragile beauty of all legal issues is that they parade as “unimportant and deferable” at first sight and to the untrained eye; but the reality of all parties and state authorities involved may be completely different.
Cost Cutting Strategies
Reflecting upon my career, I cannot remember a single employer who did not propose “let’s increase income and cut down expenses.” Yeah! And that always reminds me of the joke when the Bear complained to the Fox, a Consultant, about the problems caused by his size: He was difficult to feed, in need of a big house, and in constant danger as everyone wanted his fur. The Fox told him: “You should become a mouse. They eat little, can live in any hole, and have very few enemies.” The Bear was happy, but puzzled: “How do I become a Mouse?” And the Fox replied: “I am a Consultant. I can tell you what you need to do, not how to get there.”
Do Everything With Nothing
For those who are part of a legal department of 20 in-house lawyers or more, are regularly invited by their Managing Director/CEO for breakfast (to speak about the weather and soccer results), and for whom workload and cost pressure are foreign concepts, there is no need to read further. For all others, welcome to the In-house Club: A club of increased pressure and an increased workload with an increased scope of duties and scarce resources and budget. Welcome to the world of, as Richard Buckminster Fuller put it, “To do more and more with less and less until eventually you can do everything with nothing.”