16 FALL 2005 FIELD GENERALS In 2002, Neukom returned to private practice where he is chair of his old firm, now known as Preston Gates & Ellis LLP. Microsoft’s legal department had grown from a four-person office to a staff of more than 600, 250 of whom were professionals. But even now Neukom remains arguably the technology industry’s most recognizable general counsel, thanks to Microsoft’s extended battles with the U.S. Department of Justice and other regulatory adversaries. He’s also the elder statesman of an all-star lineup of <strong>Stanford</strong> Law School graduates who are making corporate and legal history as general counsels for technology’s ranking heavyweights: • Daniel Cooperman JD/MBA ’76, who marshaled an army of lawyers through Oracle Corp.’s bitterly fought hostile takeover of PeopleSoft Inc. from June 2003 to January 2005; • Michael Jacobson ’80, who spends his days crafting legal approaches to the previously unheard-of situations created by eBay Inc.’s entirely new system of commerce; • Mark Chandler ’81, who guides Cisco Systems, Inc.’s global push to stay atop the high-speed networking game; • Marcia Sterling ’82, who travels the world as a spokesperson for the Business Software Alliance, representing her company, Autodesk, Inc., as well as the entire software industry; • John Place ’85, who took pains to preserve Yahoo! Inc.’s fun-loving startup mojo as its first general counsel, while preparing it for adulthood as a public company; • Louis Lupin ’85, who stands guard over Qualcomm Inc.’s teeming trove of mobile communications patents; and • David Drummond ’89, who has shepherded Google Inc.’s youthful executive team through one of the most meteoric rises in the annals of technology. From the Outside In In addition to their shared alma mater, most of the field generals (with the exception of Chandler) have something else in common: they started as outside counsels but ended up going in-house. Their stories differ, but follow a similar pattern: the company retains a law firm to help it through a stock offering, a major acquisition, or an important piece of litigation; the head lawyer on the firm’s team becomes intimately familiar with the company, its strategic objectives, and its senior executives; he or she joins the company as full-time general counsel. They all describe the allure of the executive suite—the rush of being involved in major deals, the prospect of participating in the kind of rapid wealth creation that characterizes the tech industry, and the satisfaction of being part of a team that creates something permanent. “The biggest challenge as a general counsel was finding ways to explain the technology and business of Microsoft, particularly to government officials and other influentials.” —William Neukom, Microsoft “‘In-house’ was almost a derogatory term,” said Marcia Sterling, who left her partner perch at Wilson Sonsini Goodrich & Rosati to become general counsel of Autodesk in 1995. “I thought I was going to work less hard,” she said with a laugh. “Going from being a partner at a big firm to being a general counsel, you have no training for being an executive,” said Sterling. “As most employees work their way up the corporate ladder, they learn about sharing power, building consensus, how to push an agenda ahead. We come in cold at the executive level.” As a newly minted executive, Sterling was unprepared for the challenge of frequent public speaking engagements. In her first week on the job, Sterling found herself on a panel in front of an audience of 150 mid- and upper-level Autodesk managers. That’s when it hit her that being an executive meant having something more profound to say than expressing a legal opinion. It’s also when she first noticed the symptoms of spasmodic dysphonia, a neurological condition that affects control over the vocal cords. After several speaking engagements, Sterling approached Autodesk CEO Carol Bartz to discuss whether her vocalcord condition was hurting her job performance. “She told me, ‘I didn’t hire you for the sound of your voice,’” recalls Sterling. “‘I hired you for the quality of your thinking and your judgment.’” Her confidence bolstered by Bartz’s support, Sterling not only stayed on as general counsel and continued to speak at Autodesk events, but has since Josh McHugh is a contributing editor at Wired. The San Francisco– based writer’s articles have also appeared in Outside, Fortune Small Business, and Slate.
FIELD GENERALS 17 STANFORD LAWYER Daniel Cooperman JD/MBA ’76 Senior Vice President, General Counsel, and Secretary, Oracle Marcia Sterling ’82 Senior Vice President, General Counsel, and Secretary, Autodesk
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