Rena Hozore Reiss, General Counsel of Hyatt Hotels. 2011. HANDOUT. |

Marriott International Inc. has selected a new general counsel.

Rena Hozore Reiss is moving from Hyatt Hotels Corp. to Marriott as its new general counsel and executive vice president, the Maryland-based hospitality company announced Thursday.

Reiss, who starts Dec. 4, replaces Ed Ryan as Marriott's top lawyer. The company announced earlier this week that Ryan would retire the same month after 21 years with the legal department and continue in an advisory role to Marriott CEO Arne Sorenson through 2018. Ryan had been Marriott's GC since 2006.

This won't be Reiss' first time working for Marriott. She served as associate general counsel and senior vice president at the company from 2000 to 2010 before stepping into the top legal role at Hyatt, headquartered in Chicago, for seven years.

“I have a special place in my heart for Marriott – the company that introduced me to hospitality – and am thrilled to be coming back to help navigate the company during such an exciting time in its evolution,” Reiss said in a press release Thursday.

Sorenson, in the release, added that Reiss' “extensive global and broad leadership experience combined with her 17 years in the hospitality industry” will complement the legal department.

“Rena will be a transformative leader who will continue to elevate the company's commitment to excellence and integrity,” Sorenson said.

While at Hyatt, Reiss was integral is boosting diversity within the legal department of nearly 60 law professionals (as of 2013), particularly for women. At the time, she told the National Law Journal that 17 or the 28 in-house lawyers were female.

Reiss was among the lawyers honored last week in Washington D.C. at the Transformative Leadership Awards during the annual Women, Influence and Power in Law conference.