Tessa Schwartz and Angela Petros were featured in Global Leaders in Law article discussing initial findings in the Leading With Influence report, a project Morrison & Foerster is working on with Global Leaders in Law that investigates both the existing and the most desired leadership skills and competencies, and how these compare to others on the executive team.

According to Angela, the pressures on general counsel couldn't be higher right now, not just due to the COVID-19 pandemic, but also to the economic uncertainty and intense conversations over racial and social justice happening in many parts of the world.

"What struck us was a different emphasis," Angela said of findings from the first stages of research. "[GCs are] spending more time on building human connections, building empathy. Communications emerges as a primary focus where it might have been an afterthought before. GCs are having to build these skills in real time."

Tessa added that the number of stakeholders, from employees to clients to the community, is growing, and communicating effectively with those groups is increasingly important.

"Authentic leadership is about being true to the organization's values, and if you are lucky and your values and your organization's values are highly overlapping, it makes it a lot easier to do those things," she said. "Then communication is very authentic and flows from values."

Read the  full article.

Reprinted with permission. The original interview can be found on the Global Leaders in Law website.