Operationalizing the Law Department of the Future

Emil is co-founder and CEO of ContractRoom, a Contract Management and Agreement-Building platform, recipient of the LegalTech News’ 2016 Innovation Award.

Emil leads ContractRoom’s product and business vision to make the world more agreeable. Since 2012 his team has leveraged design thinking and artificial intelligence to improve the way people agree and business is done.

With over 20 years as an entrepreneur in tech, media and design, he co-founded Megazines Publications and America Riches and held executive positions at the National Basketball Association, and VIX (formerly Batanga Networks). He serves as a board member of Miami Music Project and EndPoverty.org.

Emil earned his degree in Design and Communications from the Istituto Europeo di Design in Milan, Italy.

Heather Jacobson has worked with corporate law department leadership on strategic and operational initiatives for over 10 years. Heather helps law departments define their vision and goals and develop applicable processes, roles, systems, and training to create sustainable savings and efficiencies.

Heather leads and manages client projects ranging in size and complexity. Most recently, she led multiple multi-year law department transformation that resulted in 15-30% cost savings through transformational change. Both projects involved law departments of 600 team members. Heather has worked with clients in various industries, such as: financial services, consumer products, technology, and manufacturing. Heather is known for her creativity in solving the complex challenges that corporate law departments face.

The projects both addressed internal resource optimization; outside counsel and vendor management (spend and risk); matter management selection and implementation; delegation and project management training for lawyers; leadership dashboards and reports; and improvements in client service delivery.

Previously, Heather was a Director at Huron Legal where, in addition to her client work, she led the continuous improvement of project methodology, facilitated leadership training programs, and was an advisor to the women’s networking group. She also served on the Associate Board for Coordinated Advice & Referral Program for Legal Services (CARPLS) in Chicago.

Heather received her BA in Finance from University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and MBA in Finance and Operations Management from DePaul University.

Catie is a seasoned attorney and business professional with extensive experience leading best-in-practice legal and contracts and commercial management teams in technology-driven companies. For more than two decades, she has enabled global sales organizations to achieve efficiencies throughout all phases of large and small business transactions.

Currently, Catie serves as the global operations executive for UnitedLex client, DXC Technology (DXC), where she guides the day-to-day direction of DXC’s legal department operations and strategy in collaboration with the company’s legal leadership team. She provides senior-level coordination and issue resolution in areas including transactions, litigation, immigration, and legal operations with a focus on using technology and process optimization to deliver high-quality legal services within desired cost targets. She currently oversees more than 170 transactions legal and commercial professionals.

Catie received her B.A. from Ohio Wesleyan University and her J.D. from Suffolk Law School, and is admitted to practice in New Hampshire. In addition to being an avid speaker, Catie was selected to participate in the Next Women 50 program in 2017 and was named a 2011 national fellow with the Leadership Council for Legal Diversity. She is a member of the International Association of Commercial Contract Management, Association of Corporate Counsel, and American Bar Association.

Gabriel brings a unique perspective on maximizing the effectiveness and efficiencies of in-house legal departments and in understanding how outside counsel can provide greater value to their corporate clients.

Gabriel joins UnitedLex from Hewlett-Packard Company (“HP”) where he spent almost 19 years and was most recently the SVP & Deputy General Counsel for the PC and Printing business group. Gabriel also served as head of strategy for the legal function at HP from 2009 to 2014 where he worked on a number of transformative initiatives inside the HP legal department. Gabriel focuses on ensuring that UnitedLex is delivering “dial changing” solutions to both legal department and law firm clients. Prior to joining HP, Gabriel worked in the corporate department of Greenberg Traurig, an AmLaw top 10 firm with more than 1,800 lawyers.

Gabriel earned a J.D. from Harvard Law School and a B.B.A. in International Marketing and Finance from the University of Miami.