When Mary Ann Hynes was named general counsel of information services provider CCH Inc. in 1979, at the age of 32, she became the first woman to hold the role in a Fortune 500 company.

Now, after serving in the same position at four other global businesses, she's delighted to look out from her current seat as senior counsel at Dentons and observe that 25 percent of Fortune 500 GCs are women.

“I want to keep that number rising,” she says.

Hynes, now 70, favorably compares that figure to women directors, who comprise only 18 to 20 percent of the Fortune 500, and women CEOs, at only 6.4 percent.

“We need to share our learning, because you learn from your mistakes, and you learn from observing things you could have done better,” she adds. “Most importantly, you share your contacts and your network.”

According to Aetna general counsel Tom Sabatino, who's known Hynes for two decades through a network of Chicago-area GCs, she backs up the talk. “She's been an incredible mentor for women, and she's just a good mentor of people,” he says.

Hynes was one of just seven women in the entire John Marshall Law School when she enrolled at the age of 20. When she graduated in 1971, a friend pointed her toward an interview at CCH.

“They said, 'When would you like to start?' I said, 'How about tomorrow?' I was hungry to dive in,” she recalls.

Starting as a legal editor, she rapidly rose through the organization. Aided with an LLM in taxation, CCH's signature area, Hynes expressed an interest in management. She met the CEO, found herself handling special projects and, after just eight years, while pregnant with her second child, she was named GC.

“I really challenged myself to be the full general counsel—not the person who sits in their office and waits to be asked a question,” she says. “I made myself a student of governance, of compliance and just jumped into the pool.”

That curiosity served Hynes well as her career took her to GC positions at Wolters Kluwer, which acquired CCH in 1996, and then at aerospace business Sundstrand, commodity company IMC Global and food industry giant Ingredion Inc.

“She's fundamentally interested in learning,” Sabatino says.

During Hynes' tenure at Ingredion—serving not just as GC, but also corporate secretary and chief compliance officer—the company secured a record-setting $58 million judgment under the the North American Free Trade Agreement and saw its stock price quadruple.

“Your general counsel can be a lawyer or a lawyer-slash-businessperson that's part of the team. They can help you do things or say no to everything. She helped us do things,” former Ingredion CEO Sam Scott says.

But Hynes, who joined Dentons in 2013 after hitting Ingredion's mandatory retirement threshold, was no pushover.

“She wasn't afraid to say no to anybody, but she said it in such a way that you didn't get hurt.” Scott says.

Advice to young lawyers: “While I love technology, you have to see people. You need to look them in the eye. They need to trust you, you need to be their confidante. And if they trust you, they will open up and tell you the things you need to know.”