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IN-HOUSE PROFILES
FEATURE
Best of InHouse
interviews
Our sister publication, Lexpert, profiles in-house counsel regularly online
at lexpert.ca/news/in-house-lawyer. Below is a selection of profiles
featured by Lexpert this year
PUBLIC-SECTOR IN-HOUSE WORK
MEANS OWNING OUTCOMES, NOT
WRITING MEMOS
Public-sector in-house roles force lawyers to
stop hiding behind memos and start helping
decision-makers move. That is the view of
Dorothy Wong, vice president, legal and
corporate services at ICBC, who argues that
legal advice matters only when it fits into
the messy, time-pressured reality of how
organizations actually operate.
Wong began her career articling at Lang
Michener, which later became McMillan LLP,
where the full-service grind built technical
muscle. But it also kept her away from the
real-life consequences of the deals she helped
close. Once the documents were signed, she
found herself wondering what would happen
after the transaction and why the organization
had decided to pursue a particular path in the
first place. That curiosity led her to an in-house
opportunity at the Vancouver Airport Authority.
At the airport, she watched executives
weigh legal risk against serving the community,
financial constraints, and customer impact.
Legal advice, she realized, is only one input
in a larger decision-making matrix. Promoted
to director of legal services, she moved from
being responsible for her own files to being
accountable for how the legal team served the
organization. "It was this legal management
role that I didn't think about before when I
went in-house," she says. "And it's now the
trajectory that I am on."
By the time the ICBC opportunity
came about, Wong was already drawn to
the public-sector model. ICBC provides
mandatory basic auto insurance for every
driver in the province and delivers driver
licensing, provincial identity cards, and a
road safety mandate that touches nearly
every resident. She pushes her team to get
out from behind their desks and spend time
with internal clients.
Wong is candid that leadership is not a
natural extension of private-practice success.
"You have to go into it with some humility," she
says. "It's a totally different skill set."
DOROTHY WONG
Company: ICBC
Title: Vice president, legal and corporate
services
INHOUSE INTERVIEWS
FEATURE
