Law Story 1– Craig Duncan
“Know your endgame and work backwards”
An absolute privilege to interview Craig Duncan and learn his law story. Follow along as we take a dive into Craig’s journey into law, the challenges he overcame and how he is now head of Legal at Matterport.
This story is enriched with a strong City background and for any aspiring tech lawyers or anyone aspiring to work in-House, you do not want to miss out on the wisdom and knowledge Craig shares.
If you wish to learn more from Craig, feel free to follow him on LinkedIn.
To watch the interview click here
Listen to the full story:
Please introduce yourself and what is it you currently do ?
I am currently director of international legal at Matterport Inc, a US Silicone Valley tech company whose aim is to digitalise the built world creating digital twins of buildings, homes and factories. I look after the International legal team and deal with anything legal within a tech company.
I have been a lawyer for twenty five years and trained at Wilde Sapte now known as Dentons which is the worlds biggest law firm and have worked for a range of companies and firms over the years.
What initially inspired you to pursue a career in law?
Because it was the most difficult thing to do. I am registered partially sighted meaning I cannot drive, see in the dark and was told that doing law or history was really difficult. Being stubborn and obstinate I decided to prove everyone wrong and pursue a career in law. I did my GCSE’s in the late 1980’s and the TV had great programmes such as LA Law which were so fun and entertaining and with shows like suits, if that was around then I would have signed straight up !
I wanted something challenging, something that was a respectable career that I could always earn money from and knew it paid well and opened many opportunities.
Other than the challenges you have mentioned, did you face any other challenges along the way, and how did you overcome them?
The biggest challenge I had was my drive to work in the City, I didn’t want to work in the High Street and I wanted to be a corporate lawyer. I went to an average University and a normal comprehensive school and we didn’t have the mentoring people have today. For me, it was take the A-Levels you like best and decide from a book. The challenege therefore was getting to where I got to.
I didn’t have the best A-Levels or a degree from a Top 20 University, but I had gut and determination to get a training contract. I had already completed my LPC and didn’t have a training contract. I got a book which was effectively the paper version of the Legal 500 and located 250 firms in the City. I hand wrote a letter to every single firm to say I only wanted to work in the City and that I would do my training contract for free to just show a guy with an outside chance can do well. I must have received daily responses, some big firms saying it was ingenious, others saying they couldn’t offer anything and from this I secured 3 interviews in the City. Following my interview with Wilde Spate (Dentons) I came along for a work experience week and really enjoyed this. The idea of the work experience week was to come out of it and begin formal interviews however, the HR director David offered me the training contract straight after the work experience week and handed me a cheque for the cost of the LPC Fees I had already paid for.
This grit and determination and the 250 letters did pay off and I didn’t have to work for free !
With your desire to work in the City, did you have any mentors or role models who influenced your career path?
I think 95% was graft. There was no LinkedIn, no networking nothing. I did have a brilliant tutor at University who was the Law Professor Lyndsey Squire and she was outstanding and she did have some contacts. She thought my idea about the letters was fantastic and stayed in contact and supported me even after I left after University.
For those aspiring, you all have a massive opportunity with LinkedIn and networking events to get to know people. Don’t go around just trying to connect with everyone, think about why you want to connect and send them a message. I would even suggest getting LinkedIn premium for a month just to make those thirty connections as thats where it starts off.
Aside from networking, what other advice would you give to aspiring lawyers who are just starting their journey?
I think they have to know. You have to know your endgame. Whilst people may say they want to be a Human Rights Lawyer, a contract lawyer etc but, do you want to work abroad, work in the city, become a partner or become legal counsel. The main thing you need to think of is your end goal and start working backwards.
My endgame was, I knew I wanted to work in the City but I did not want to be a partner in the City as I knew by the time I got there I would be married and have a family and I wanted to see them so I knew I wanted to transition into In House. I had it all mapped out and feel if I did not have it all mapped out, I would have likely applied locally and completed my training contract locally. This would have been perfectly fine and local firms do a fantastic job however, I don’t think I would have ever made that leap into the city and been able to work in tech and now be in charge of the legal team of a two billion dollar company.
Knowing where you want to end up and work backwards is the best way and of course there are challenges, there a knock backs and there are hurdles along the way which you have to take and learn from them and keep going.
So:
Know the end goal.
Get networking.
Sign up to any events related to your desired field or firm.
Being honest at networking events, don’t try and be the smartest in the room, the law really is a people skills job.
Read around the area and show initiative.
What is the transition like from Big Firm Work to In-House Counsel ?
I think there is two main differences. One being the law, and the other being working within a corporation.
The law is quite easily transferrable and the focus changes to understanding what the business drivers are whether that be revenue or growth and the law is something to support this as opposed to override. Working in a firm gives the knowledge, training, ability to draft and negotiate and make you into a good employee with file management and developing people skills. A law firm will also teach you how to deal with feedback both positive and negative and build the ability to manage staff as you will likely have some sort of PA or assistants and so when you become a manager in-house with different people you know how to deal with these things.
One piece of advice, do not go into an in-house role expecting it to be like a law firm. You are no longer a revenue generated asset, you are a very expensive overhead. You have to earn your money in-house and you won’t have the support you have at a law firm and you are far more business focused and commercially minded. An answer could be ‘no’ however make sure there is a ‘but’, find solutions for the company as opposed to just giving advice.
Building on being more of business minded, how do you stay updated on changes in the law and business ?
I absolutely love podcasts. One of the main podcasts I listen to is the ‘Diary of a CEO’ podcast. I never thought I would ever quote Jimmy Carr in a business sense but understanding the different concepts people have of things is very enthralling. Another gentleman I have become very close with being Lee Cockerell former executive Vice President of Walt Disney World who has written four leadership and customer centric books all based on the Disney mentality and I have learnt a lot from Lee.
I also follow the news quite frequently and attend seminars however, a lot of it does come down to own teachings in order to train other parts of the business and in order to train, you have to know about that area whether that’s finance, marketing or sales.
There is also LinkedIn learning which is also very useful to obtain certificates and also network. We also have ‘Focus Friday’s’ where we do not do any meetings and spend the day on personal development.
In your opinion, what are some of the most pressing issues you face on a day to day basis?
Controlling and keeping policies and procedures in the company in place. Sales are very unique and there is always a slight disconnect between sales and legal. Here at legal we are more risk protectors and the sales are the go getters and there needs to be a middle ground. Therefore, the hardest thing for me is to ensure the policies and procedures put in place are workable and implemented in a way that wont restrict sales hitting their targets, but this must be done in a responsible way. Contracts need to be enforceable and delivered upon.
The other challenge is managing things, ensuring appropriate systems are put in place such as ticketing systems and contract lifecycle management systems (CLM). By doing this it shows we are both a responsive and value adding team and ensuring the business is moving quicker. The best way to make a business move quicker is to streamline processes, always improve and always move forward.
Was there a pivotal moment or case that had a significant impact on your career?
Yes there was ! I am a tech lawyer through and through but when I started my training there was no such thing as tech law. I have always loved tech I use to build my own PC’s and people at the firm knew I loved tech.
Our IP partner was then dealing with a computer copyright case so there were two big trading houses in which some coders moved from one trading house to another and were accused of taking this code with them and stealing it. I was then asked to sit in a room with two experts and go through piles of code and locate whether any code had been copied. I had never realised before this point that tech was in the law and from this, I realised I could do something in the law I loved and from that I decided I was just going to be a tech lawyer.
After I left Dentons, I joined Lloyds Bank who had just started an IT Legal team, and I was the first person on it! I reported to the IT director and not the general counsel and from there it just sky rocketed.
Looking back, would you make any changes to you law story ?
I am a big believer in you don’t have any regrets you just have learnings and I have no regrets. I am very lucky to have the career I have had and I have been lucky to have worked remotely for most of my work so I have spent a lot of time with my kids growing up, I never missed a school play, football and rugby matches whilst still maintaining a good job at a high level.
There is part of me that thinks when I talk to my friends who I trained with who are now all partners whether I want a part of that, but I look at what they sacrificed to get there and that wasn’t for me.
I enjoy my job and I enjoy mentoring as part of my job. I love leading teams and developing lawyers so no, I do not have a regret at all.