Top Law Schools

Hi TLS,

Has anyone had any experience or advice on pivoting from in house commercial counsel to product, privacy, or corporate counsel? Would also be interested in how to move into government positions too though I would assume that may be tough without government contracts experience.

Thanks in advance!

Anonymous User wrote: ↑

Fri Jan 06, 2023 2:09 pm

Hi TLS,

Has anyone had any experience or advice on pivoting from in house commercial counsel to product, privacy, or corporate counsel? Would also be interested in how to move into government positions too though I would assume that may be tough without government contracts experience.

Thanks in advance!

Product counsel here. I think this will depend on your experience prior to moving in-house and your experiences as commercial counsel. If you're thinking about moving to another department within the same company, try to work closer with the teams you're interested in joining and build relationships with members of those teams. Then carefully express your interest. If you're thinking about moving to another company, try to pitch your XFN collaboration with product legal, privacy legal, and other XFN colleagues on joint product/program reviews.

Anonymous User wrote: ↑

Fri Jan 06, 2023 2:09 pm

Hi TLS,

Has anyone had any experience or advice on pivoting from in house commercial counsel to product, privacy, or corporate counsel? Would also be interested in how to move into government positions too though I would assume that may be tough without government contracts experience.

Thanks in advance!

Worth noting that the rigidity of these distinctions may vary by company/industry. For example, my company has no title or formal distinction between commercial and corporate counsel, and we don't have
"product counsel" because we sell commodities. Anyhow, I'm sure there's a way to pivot as long as you have a skill set that works outside of your specific niche. "Government" is a massive umbrella, and I wouldn't say "government" is entirely out just because you haven't worked with government contracts before.

Was product counsel, then commercial counsel with a focus on privacy, and have pivoted back to product counsel.

OP, have you told your counterpart in product legal or on the privacy team that you're interested in learning more about their work & would be happy to help out on overflow work? IMO, it may be worth asking and see what they say.

I made the switch from commercial counsel to product counsel internally at my company. We’re a fairly small legal team and as a result I was pitching in to assist on a number of privacy/product issues anyway. Eventually the company grew to the point where it made sense to dedicate someone to just product and expand the commercial legal department. I agree with the above poster that it may be worth feeling this out with your direct manager and legal team to see if there’s an opportunity to make the shift within the company. You’ll at the very least be coming in with legacy knowledge about your company and industry even if you may not have the SM expertise yet.

Otherwise, I’d recommend looking for a more generalist role in a start-up. Start-ups care first and foremost about bringing in revenue, so your commercial experience will be desirable but you’ll also get to touch a lot of other areas in that kind of role.