In-House Counsel Embed at Law Firms to Impart Corporate View

Mayer Brown and Wilson Sonsini Goodrich & Rosati are taking a page from venture capital companies, bringing in experienced corporate lawyers for short stints at the firms so they can share their business knowledge with clients and get a chance to expand their skills.

“The program allows us to provide our clients with more practical, insider perspectives on the challenges and opportunities they face,” said Nina Flax, a partner in Mayer Brown’s Northern California office.

Flax started the initiative in 2023, modeling it after entrepreneur-in-residence programs that are common at venture capital firms. For years, VC firms such as the D.E. Shaw Group and the Heritage Group have embedded experienced professionals in temporary roles to provide strategic guidance, help develop new ventures, and drive innovation.

Wilson Sonsini joined Chicago-based Mayer Brown in creating a general counsel-in-residence program in February.

“Imitation is the most sincere form of flattery,” Raj De, a Mayer Brown partner in Washington, said. “Lots of people recognize what Nina and I did and are heading in that same direction.”

With clients around the world in industries such as fintech, energy, insurance and technology, finding experienced corporate counsel to embed at Mayer Brown for six to 12 months at a time has been a challenge. De said experience and personality have been key as they recruited and hosted two in-house counsels since launching their program.

“We’re looking for someone who first and foremost understands the intricacies of an industry from the inside,” Flax said.

Wilson Sonsini, known for its clients in tech, life sciences and among Silicon Valley entrepreneurs, has already recruited three in-house counsel to help advise the firm’s clients.

Their first was Kiki Haar, who began her career as a corporate and securities associate at Wilson Sonsini before taking in-house roles at public and private technology companies.

She said the program is an opportunity to enhance her “own business perspective,” and “professional objectives.”

The mutual benefits for the law firms and general counsels make these residency programs appealing. Irene Liu, a board member at the University of California, Berkeley Center for Law and Business, said the law firms gain “insider knowledge of how an in-house department and a corporation works.”

In turn, she said, the general counsel “benefits by aligning themself with a prestigious law firm while gaining exposure to new experiences and challenges that enhance their future career prospects.”

‘Fire Hose’ of Information

When Michele Lee, a former in-house counsel for Pinterest and Twitter, was approached by Wilson Sonsini, she recognized participating in the program would mark “an interesting change” in her career.

“My expectation was that it would be very different,” Lee said. “Instead of just thinking about one client, I’m getting to know other clients often very quickly.”

The transition has been intellectually stimulating, she notes.

“It’s a fire hose of information where you’re trying to learn the company’s business and really getting to know a client on the fly. And then multiply that by X number of clients, it’s a different type of challenge,” Lee said.

Meanwhile, Marc Berger reached out to Wilson Sonsini, expressing interest in applying his more than 25 years of senior legal and executive experience in digital health to the counsel-in-residence role.

“Having sat in the chair that some of Wilson’s clients are sitting in, I can empathize with the decision-making challenges they face,” Berger said. “I can build off those precedents.”