Clockwise from bottom left: Thomas Scott (lead counsel, privacy, ethics and compliance), Kelsey Northend (legal administrator), Robert Kwant (legal operations manager), Hayden Bui (corporate and securities counsel), Teresa Hoover (paralegal), Yvonne Pham (corporate counsel), David Anderson (legal manager), Sheldon Quan (deputy general counsel), Becky Silver (executive assistant), Matt Gipple (general counsel). (Photo: Jason Doiy/ALM)

The legal department at self-driving car company Cruise has overseen fast growth and multiple rounds of outside investment from the likes of Honda and institutional investors such as T. Rowe Price. The effort landed Cruise's in-house department finalist honors in the Most Innovative Emerging Company Legal Department of the Year category of The Recorder's California Leaders in Tech Law and Innovation Awards. Matt Gipple, general counsel of the Softbank- and GM-backed company, recently discussed the characteristics of his in-house team with The Recorder.

The Recorder: What are the distinguishing characteristics of Cruise's in-house legal department and the lawyers and staff that make it up?

Matt Gipple: The thing that most distinguishes us is our commitment to the mission of the company. We believe in what Cruise is doing, and aren't just here for a job. I think many departments would say their people have high integrity, they work to facilitate the business, they are smart, etc., and I would say all those things about Cruise legal too, but what distinguishes us is our common commitment to Cruise's mission. A close second is that we embrace managing a high degree of ambiguity and change.

What was the biggest challenge your in-house team faced in the past year and how did you overcome it?

The biggest challenge was maintaining our connection with the company as it went from a place where you could know everyone to a 1,500-plus person organization. We had numerous substantive challenges, but the common thread and something the entire group managed was to build their scope of influence and build the "brand" of legal. We addressed this challenge by showing up anywhere and everywhere, providing great service to our stakeholders, adding strategic value to initiatives, hiring excellent team members, and consistently messaging what legal was about.

Besides that challenge, what was your legal department's most significant accomplishment of the past year and why?

Our biggest accomplishment of the last year was spearheading the growth of the company's crisis response capabilities. There is intense scrutiny on Cruise, and we needed the ability to respond effectively to a crisis. Over the last year we created a framework for classifying crises, built operations plans around certain types of incidents, supported other teams in developing related plans and processes, and ran a simulation exercise to train and identify areas for improvement. While our work is never done, the efforts over the last year have put the company in a more mature, more scalable, and overall better place, and I'm very proud of the team for what they accomplished on this.