Legal for scaleups

You've just joined a high-growth tech company as its first lawyer. How do you get from square one to a dynamic, scalable legal function? We gathered expert insights from legal at some of the world's fastest-growing businesses to find out.

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What's inside?

This eBook contains insights direct from GCs, CLOs and Heads of Legal at Intercom, Monzo, GoCardless, Babylon Health, Snyk, Appear Here, TransferWise and more. From creating a 90 day plan, to building your team, preparing for your first funding round and managing international expansion, they'll guide you through every challenge lawyers face when establishing legal infrastructure from the ground up. Explore the chapter list in full below.

Foreword

Legal for scaleups

What’s it like to walk into a high-growth tech company as its first lawyer? You walk into the office on day one and ask yourself, what’s on fire? The company is growing, moving quickly, has great momentum, so something must be on fire - right?

Adam Glick is the VP of Legal Affairs and Corporate Secretary at Front, a modern customer service platform. In his role, he is responsible for overseeing and managing all legal matters for the fast-growing enterprise SaaS company, as well as advising on general corporate matters and working closely with executive management. Before joining Front, Adam was the Head of Legal at Intercom, and held several senior legal roles at companies like Nutanix and Splunk. Adam also has a deep background in data privacy and security.

Chapter 1

Your first 90 days

The first lawyer at a high-growth scaleup has an enormous task ahead of them: to build a robust, scalable legal infrastructure from the ground up. Where do you start, and how do you plan ahead?

Henry Bennett is the SVP M&A and Corporate Development at Brainlabs, a global digital-first media agency. Before joining Brainlabs, Henry worked at Babylon as the Chief Legal Officer, where he joined as the startup's first lawyer in 2017. Before that, Henry trained and qualified at leading law firm, Slaughter and May.

Chapter 2

Creating an MVP contracting process

There’s no point looking to the future if you don’t have a solid baseline, and there’s nothing more foundational to legal than contracts. How do you build a minimum viable product for your contracting process?

Stephanie Dominy is a General Counsel at Staffbase, a Series E company that offers a platform to streamline employee communication. Before joining Staffbase, Stephanie was a Senior Consultant at Seven Legal, and previously the GC at Snyk where she lead the legal and risk management function.

Chapter 3

How to enable your commercial team

Everyone in a scaleup is focused on growth, and legal should be no different. You might have a million competing priorities, but enabling your commercial colleagues should be at the top of your list from day one.

Willem Wellinghoff is the UK Chairman and Chief Compliance Officer at Ecompay, where he is responsible for all things compliance, legal, and risk. He is an experienced commercial and legal advisor with more than 20 years of experience in the financial services, crime, and technology sector.

Chapter 4

Working with founders: soft skills

Soft skills are invaluable - especially for a lawyer working at a high-growth scaleup for the first time. Here’s how you can adopt and implement soft skills to succeed in your role.

Taryn Strong is a Senior Associate at Cripps, a B Corp™ certified law firm based in Kent. Before joining Kripps, Taryn was a Legal and Investment Consultant at LOD, and Legal Counsel at Channel 4. Taryn also has an MBA from Imperial College Business School.

Chapter 5

Building your team

Once you’ve survived your first few months at a scaleup, you’re likely to realise that reinforcements would be useful. But how do you put together a world-class team?

Ahmed Badr is the Chief Operating Officer at GoCardless, where he previously held roles as General Counsel, and Chief Legal and Risk Officer. Ahmed originally trained as a lawyer at Allen and Overy before becoming an Associate there. Alongside his legal roles, Ahmed has also sat as a panel member for the Payment Systems Regulator, and as a member of the FinTech Delivery Panel with Tech Nation.

Chapter 6

How can legal enable velocity?

If your whole company is geared towards velocity and growth, then legal has a key role to play. What are the practices and behaviours that ensure lawyers are enablers and not blockers?

Sophie Salisbury is the Head of Legal at Appear Here, the world's leading marketplace to rent space. Sophie has more than ten years of legal experience and expertise, working at international law firm, CMS, before moving in-house as a Legal Counsel. Sophie implemented Juro's intelligent contract automation software at Appear Here and successfully streamlined the entire contract process.

Chapter 7

Getting privacy right

In the digital age, privacy and compliance are paramount - but misconceptions and a lack of understanding can make it challenging for scaleups to implement these policies. Here’s how lawyers can enable teams to lead with privacy in mind.

Karima Noren is the Co-founder of The Privacy Compliance Hub, a platform that delivers training, information, templates, and reporting functionality. Before becoming an entrepreneur, Karima worked at Google as Senior Legal Counsel and, more recently, Head of Emerging Markets.

Chapter 8

Your first funding round

Funding rounds involve a mountain of legal work - here’s how can lawyers collaborate with founders and ensure they’re fully prepared for the raise.

Richard Mabey is the CEO and co-founder of Juro, the intelligent contract automation platform. Under his leadership, Juro has scaled rapidly, backed by $38 million in venture funding from prominent investors including Eight Roads, USV, Point Nine Capital and Seedcamp, and the founders of companies like Indeed, Gumtree and Wise.

Richard trained and qualified at Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer, working as an M&A associate in London and New York. He gained an MBA from INSEAD, and then spent time at LegalZoom, learning to build legal tech products.

Frustrated by the manual legal processes that slow down businesses, Richard co-founded Juro in 2016, with a mission to help the world agree contracts faster. Beyond Juro, he hosts the "Brief Encounters" podcast, makes angel investments, and supports other ambitious ventures from the boardroom. Richard is a Fellow of the RSA, an adviser to The Entrepreneurs Network and sits as a Non-executive Director of Bright Blue.

Chapter 9

Embedding an operations mindset

If your scaleup starts to hit white-hot growth, processes that aren’t robust will break pretty quickly. How did Monzo create a mindset that led to frictionless, scalable legal operations?

James Sullivan is the Global General Counsel at Bitstamp, a global cryptocurrency exchange. In his role, James is accountable for legal, risk, compliance, internal audits, and market surveillance teams.

Before joining Bitstamp, James was the Chief Risk and Legal Officer at Ziglu where he was also the Chair of the Executive Risk Committee.

James has also held roles in the legal function at Monzo Bank, Funderbeam, and the Cromwell Property Group.

Chapter 10

Legal hygiene at scale

If you’re growing quickly, you need to set new joiners up for success. This includes their awareness of legal procedures, policies and compliance. How can you maintain legal hygiene as growth accelerates?

Francesca Porter is the Group General Counsel at PolyAI, and she previously held the role of General Counsel at Onfido, a fast-growing AI company where she first joined as Legal Counsel. Francesca was also shortlisted for the General Counsel of the year award at the British Legal Awards 2024. She is skilled in commercial law, negotiations, and in the delivery of strategic legal advice.

Chapter 11

Legal technology for scaleups

Legal technology isn’t a panacea, but it can help you to carry the weight of your workload. How do you know what to prioritize and when - and who can help you make it happen internally?

Jenifer Swallow is the Director of Jenifer Director of UK LawTech Delivery Panel, a government-backed initiative to transform the legal sector through the use of existing and emerging technology.

Jenifer is also an award-winning lawyer, with features in the Women in Fintech Powerlist, GC Legal 500 Powerlist, British Legal Awards, and Chambers Global 100 Most Influential General Counsels.

Jenifer specializes in all forms of technology, but with a focus on LegalTech, FinTech, and RegTech.

Chapter 12

Going global: new jurisdictions

Moving into a new jurisdiction is often a complex legal question that could benefit from months of consideration. You’re unlikely to have that at a scaleup - so how do you survive and thrive as your company explores new territories?

Alexis Alexander is the General Counsel at Inspired Education Group, and independent school group educating over 85,000 students across 110 schools in 24 countries. Before this, Alexis was the Head of Legal at Liberis, and the Senior Legal Counsel at IHS Markit. Alexis originally trained at Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer LLP, a leading global law firm.

Chapter 13

Entering the US

For almost every type of tech scaleup, the US is the most valuable market to enter, and success there can make or break the company’s long-term ambitions. Here’s what you need to know about entering the US.

Daniel Glazer is an American technology lawyer and strategic advisor, leading Wilson Sonsini’s U.S. expansion group to support UK and European tech and life sciences companies in U.S. market entry, fundraising, and growth. Recognized by The American Lawyer and Chambers USA for his expertise, he has over two decades of experience as U.S. counsel to UK and European businesses

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