In-House Interview: Nur Yalçıner Kılıç, Head of Legal, Risk & Compliance, Dx Technology Services and Investment B.V.

After graduating from Yeditepe University’s Faculty of Law in 2010, you received your master's degree from Queen Mary University of London in the field of International Commercial Law. Your career has varied from being a private practice lawyer to moving in-house. What inspired you to become an in-house lawyer?

I believe that starting my career path working with well-known law firms helped me to gain valuable experience working in different fields of law, as well as exposure to different types of clients and industries. By having an opportunity to have legal practice in different legal areas with various clients, I had a chance to improve my negotiation, client management, time management, adaptability, analytical thinking, and business development skills. While having nearly 5 (five) years of experience as a private practice lawyer in different law firms in various projects, such as M&A, compliance projects, and partnership agreement negotiations, I realized that I enjoy working closely with business teams of clients and also enjoy playing a role in shaping their business decisions and having interactive discussions. Then I decided to move in-house. Being an in-house lawyer requires having a strong understanding of the business and operations of the company in addition to legal expertise. Also, an in-house needs to deeply understand the dynamics of the company, be aware of commercial, and operational risks, and understand the scalability of the business to give satisfying support to the business. Since in-house legal have also strategic roles in shaping business decisions in organizations, there are several career opportunities for them, such as General Counsel, CLO, executive and/or advisory board member positions. I can say that all of these dynamics inspired me to become and carry on with passion as an in-house in my career path.

As an experienced in-house lawyer you have been working as legal, risk, and compliance director. When you look back at your career, what are the most challenging aspects of your job? Especially from the point of communication with clients/traders.

I can say that acting and thinking like a business partner also to protect the company’s legal interest at the same level and communicate for both at the same time could be challenging in some cases. I believe that good communication skills help to balance legal considerations and risk base approach with business realities. Also, I think communication contributes to listening actively to the business, their concerns, and priorities and this helps legal professionals to design legal concepts and strategies within the harmony of business needs. Communication is also required to find the best way of legal saying, to improve persuasive language, and to collaborate with other business units in harmony which I think they are all important for our roles.

What do you believe are the most important skills for lawyers to grasp business needs better and develop in order to succeed in-house?

I believe that they need to have a combination of business skills. As I mentioned in my previous answers, communication and collaboration skills, analytical and strategical thinking and business thinking and understanding are the most important skills for lawyers. By developing these skills, in-house lawyers can succeed in understanding the business with a wide view in which they provide legal advice that is aligned with the company’s dynamics and objectives.

What is the organizational structure of your Dx Technology Services and Investment B.V. Legal, Risk, and Compliance team? What do you look for when recruiting a new member of your team?

Our team consists of 6 members. I am head of the legal, risk, and compliance of our organisation. We have one risk&compliance specialist, two legal counsels, one paralegal, and one intern in our legal, risk, and compliance team.  In general, when recruiting a new member of our team, we look for relevant experience, strong communication skills, a result-oriented attitude, and a cultural fit. Of course, passion for law😊

What are the international trends in your industry you expect to impact the Turkish legal & compliance market the most?

Cloud-based technologies, Artificial Intelligence (“AI”), and increased focus on privacy are going to impact the Turkish legal & compliance market. Cloud-based technologies and AI offer many benefits, such as flexibility, scalability, and time efficiency to organizations, however, they also raise several legal and compliance issues that organizations need to address such as cloud providers, licensor’s security measures, location and/or flow of data, and access authorizations. Since cloud technologies and AI are increasingly being used in various industries, they will likely have an increasing impact on the Turkish legal&compliance market, especially on Turkish Data Protection Law, Turkish Competition Law and Criminal Law.

Do you have any mentoring tips?

• Take time to understand business and strategy in detail and try to be a business partner rather than an advisor,
• Focus on communication, building strong relationships and networking,
• Stay up-to-date with legal developments