Being a Legal Managing Consultant with Danh Nguyen - Episode 28

In Episode 28 of the Legal Genie Podcast, your host, Lara Quie is joined by Danh Nguyen, General Manager and Managing Consultant at KorumLegal for Europe, the Middle East, and Africa. 

KorumLegal is a legal innovator, changing the way legal solutions are created and delivered. It offers value-driven People, Managed Legal Services and Process and Tech solutions for in-house legal teams. 

Born in Vietnam, Danh has lived and worked in Australia, Hong Kong, and the UK, where he is currently based in London. 

Prior to joining KorumLegal in 2018, he was Vice President of the WU Way, a global strategic initiative tasked with transforming the culture, operating model and ways of working at Western Union. 

 Before moving to London to lead The WU Way, Danh was the Asia Pacific General Counsel of The Western Union Company based in Hong Kong.

Danh shares his career journey and best advice for lawyers. 

We hope that you will enjoy this conversation. 

You can connect with Danh on LinkedIn at https://www.linkedin.com/in/danh-nguyen-1a172654/

Also: If you liked this episode, please rate the show and leave a review wherever you listen to your podcasts to help the Legal Genie reach a wider audience.

You can follow and connect with Lara Quie on LinkedIn at: https://www.linkedin.com/in/laraquie/

Lara Q Associates
A boutique business and executive coaching consultancy

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Transcript

Legal Genie Episode 28 Danh Nguyen

[00:00:00] Hello. I'm Lara Quie and thank you for joining me for the Legal Genie Podcast. Following my career as a corporate lawyer at Dentons and DLA Piper, I reinvented myself as an entrepreneur and business development and marketing professional. I'm currently the head of business development for Asia Pacific for a leading international barristers' chambers called Twenty Essex. 

[00:00:52] After a life event in 2020 introduced me to the world of executive coaching, I set up my own consultancy called Lara Q Associates through which I coach lawyers on how to design their best life now. 

[00:01:05] I coach in-house and private practice lawyers. I help them to get unstuck and build their book of business. I also help them with personal branding, LinkedIn skills, growing self-confidence and how to get to the next level. 

[00:01:19] I'm particularly passionate about mentoring and helping young lawyers reach their full potential. 

[00:01:24] This podcast is intended to give you an insight into the lives and careers of movers and shakers in the legal industry. People who have done interesting things and have good advice to share with you. I hope that you'll find their career stories helpful in your own legal journey. 

[00:01:39] Please rate and review the podcast on Apple Podcasts to help us reach a wider audience who may also find the content of value. I hope that you'll enjoy this episode. 

[00:01:48] Lara Quie: Hello, and welcome to episode 28 of the Legal Genie podcast with me, your host, Lara Quie. This week, I'm delighted to have with me. Danh Nguyen, General Manager and Managing Consultant at KorumLegal for Europe, the Middle East and Africa. 

KorumLegal is a legal innovator changing the way legal solutions are created and delivered. It offers value-driven people, managed legal services and processing tech solutions for in-house legal teams. 

[00:02:19] Born in Vietnam, Danh has lived and worked in Australia, Hong Kong and the UK where he is currently based in London prior to joining KorumLegal in 2018, he was Vice-President of the Wu Way a global strategic initiative tasked with transforming the culture, operating model and ways of working at Western Union. 

[00:02:42] Before moving to London to lead the Wu Way, Danh was the Asia Pacific General Counsel of the Western Union company based in Hong Kong. 

Lara Quie: Welcome to the show, Danh. 

[00:02:52] Danh Nguyen: Thanks very much, Lara. How are you? 

[00:02:55] Lara Quie: I'm great. Thanks. It's good to see you here. And so I'd love to talk about where you grew up and what life was like for the young Danh?

[00:03:04] Danh Nguyen: Yeah. Shall I start at the beginning? I was born in Vietnam in the south of Vietnam, actually. And that's where I lived up until the age of about seven. And then we were refugees from Vietnam and then. Did the boat trip Malaysia to Australia. So, I arrived in Australia in June of 1978 And that's where I grew up obviously when I landed in Australia I didn't know a single word of English. And so I had to pick that up, of course but as you're a child, you do that quite easily. But I do remember still taking ESL classes, English as a second language classes for up until three, I think two or three. But thereafter I, loved English as a subject, of course in it. And that's where I really excelled at in terms of understanding linguistics languages and literature. That was my passion when I was studying in school in high school and beyond.

[00:03:53] Lara Quie: Wow, what an amazing story. We're seeing a lot of refugees right now, but it's wonderful to see how even in those days you were accepted by Australia and then became Australian. And look where you are now. It's a fantastic success story.

[00:04:10] Danh Nguyen: Yeah. No, absolutely. And I think just looking back to 1978, I think it was a different world to me at the time, sure. I was young but it seems like a much more welcoming and compassionate society I think we've moved in a direction in recent times where it's a bit concerning actually all over the world, whether it's Australia, UK, United States that sort of shift towards the right is, a little bit concerning.

[00:04:35] And I see it happening in Australia as well. And during the course of this pandemic where the Australian government has taken certain actions, which I think is somewhat pause for thought and actually and I'm glad that it's reopening now its borders, because I think that sense of isolation and being cut off from the rest of the world really doesn't actually do any good for, the country or for if people. 

[00:04:58] Lara Quie: That's absolutely right. And it's very noticeable that all the island nations have behaved in a very isolated way when it comes to the pandemic. And it's quite interesting, isn't it? If you think about how you are in Australia, obviously the UK is an island nation. Hong Kong is an island nation.

[00:05:17] I'm thinking Bermuda, Bali other, islands could be in your future, Singapore. Here I am on an island as well, so yeah, but anyway, let's talk about how it was that you decided to study law. 

[00:05:34] Danh Nguyen: Yeah, it's an interesting story. I think when you ask a lot of people, looking back into their childhood and what they wanted to be when they grow up.

[00:05:43] I think a lot of people are not very clear. That's like, I dunno, I just drifted into something but for me, it was very strangely very clear from very early on that I think from the age of maybe 10, 11 that sort of age, I knew I wanted to be a lawyer. I don't know why. It was very clear in my head, very crystal clear in my head and even my family, my father said, "look I just can see you being a lawyer when you grow up." I think I was always oh is debating I think there was always not picking fights, but just debating with anyone and everyone, including my father. And he loved that actually I miss him, he's no longer with us, but that sense of repartee back and forth and debating issues and being curious about the world, that sort of stuff.

[00:06:25] I think that it started when I was really young, Another very cheesy part of why I wanted to be a lawyer was I loved LA law back in the 1980s. It just seems like obviously it's very unreal and not very realistic it was really part of my world when I was going to go to school. And that was my sort of escape from reality 

[00:06:46] Lara Quie: Obviously, I hope that's lived up to your expectations. Yeah. L.A. Law. Yeah. That's a bit of a blast from the past. I don't think younger listeners know what we're talking about. 

[00:06:56] Danh Nguyen: Yeah. Even some of the names, like [00:07:00] really sort of household names in that show in the eighties and no one would know them anymore, I think.

[00:07:05] Lara Quie: Yeah, absolutely. Anyway, did you have anyone close to you in terms of family, friends? No one to actually give you that insight? 

[00:07:14] Danh Nguyen: No no one. I had to sort of work it out myself actually because obviously I was one of the first in my family to go to university and to really pursue a career like that sort of thing. So, I just worked it out myself. 

[00:07:28] Lara Quie: Okay. So, after university though, you went to Baker and McKenzie. So, tell me about the training and what it's like to qualify as a lawyer in Australia. 

[00:07:40] Danh Nguyen: Yeah, absolutely. One, step back a little bit. I did a couple of years almost two years in government agencies, so I was summer clerking and then became a law clerk at the human rights and equal opportunity commission.

[00:07:51] I was actually at the clerk to the president of the commission who was a former high court justice. So that was an amazing experience for someone so young and so early on in their career. And [00:08:00] it really taught me even with working with someone who is so smart, so intelligent, and has achieved the pinnacle of their careers.

[00:08:09] He was the most humble person I've ever met. Absolute delight. He was a tiny two man. Five foot nothing, but he was a powerhouse intellect, but so generous with his time and very generous with his ideas and his patience it was incredible luck that you had that experience so early in your career really lays a really good mark on you as, a person and as a professional lawyer.

[00:08:32] And then I did another year at the Australian broadcasting authority, which is basically the regulator for all things, broadcasting in Australia. And again, very interesting did policy work and it did legal analysis broadcasting laws as it applies to the authorities of work and things like that.

[00:08:48] So amazing experience as well. Then I joined Baker and McKenzie. And so I think that those two experiences perhaps paved the way for me to join Baker and McKenzie actually, because they were interested in my broadcasting experience. I was joining the ITC department within Baker and McKenzie, international technology communications.

[00:09:05] And having someone with that sort of regulatory experience from the government and regulator side, I think was, it was interesting to them. Yeah. So when I did join them I wasn't like a baby lawyer per se but it was a bit very junior still but it was a great experience.

[00:09:19] Of course I learned a lot and especially on the technical side of things learning how to draft those long hours and nights and days it was, it didn't come to naught. I had to say but it did drum into me that they need to be excellent at drafting and being very clear about communications and clear about what it is that you're trying to say and put onto paper. And when you're actually communicating with clients and, your colleagues. 

[00:09:43] Lara Quie: So it sounds like you went straight into IT and communications quite early. But how did you know that you wanted to go into that area? Because in the UK, for example, you generally do two year training contract and you'll do four different seats and you're just trying things out, but how did you get a taste of it?

[00:10:01] Danh Nguyen: Yeah. In my case, because I had missed the boat because I didn't go in to the law firm as a clerk as, a trainee. They could only slot me into a department that fit my experience up to that point and, background so that's the reason why I went into that and I started specializing in ITC.

[00:10:19] Lara Quie: Okay. So basically because of that, Australian Broadcasting experience, and obviously you must've enjoyed that type of work. And so you were quite happy to join that. Yeah. And in those days as well we can must admit it's a couple of decades ago that sort of area of law was still relatively new, wasn't It?

[00:10:39] Danh Nguyen: It was. And the other thing I should mention is that I actually did, in terms of my degree at university, I did obviously the law degree, but I also majored in mass communications. And so, I really had an interest in that from, earlier days I think, and I said, the ability to combine those two disciplines together actually was really quite powerful for me, and here was a chance for me to [00:11:00] actually combine those two interests as well. 

[00:11:02] Lara Quie: Yeah. but after being at Baker and McKenzie a few years, you obviously thought, wow, I would like to do something else. So, tell me about what you did next. 

[00:11:12] Danh Nguyen: Yeah. So, I was there about almost five years and during that time, towards the end of it, I did do a secondment at Virgin mobile, which is a, company owned by the Virgin group and that they were setting up their mobile operations in Australia and I was seconded to their team for about three months.

[00:11:26] And that really gave me the first taste of what it felt like to be in house to really work very closely with business and marketing teams Where you don't have your partners or senior associates, there looking over your shoulders, that sort of thing. And you have that sense of autonomy and being very intimately connected with the business how they were doing their things how they wanted to sort of launch products and things like that. And so to me that was really exciting to be a part of that and to be making a contribution, no matter how small it is to, be part of the team that actually launched the product. One of the most interesting things that I did was Richard Branson was [00:12:00] coming to Australia to essentially be part of the launch of the service and I had to negotiate the contract with the events company that was because he does all these crazy things and he was going to hang off the bottom of a helicopter flying across Sydney Harbour. And so I had to negotiate like the indemnity and the liability clauses right up to midnight the night before that he was doing it. Of course, it went off without a hitch next day, but still it was really interesting.

[00:12:25] Lara Quie: That definitely sounds very interesting. And,thank goodness. He was fine. It could just fit a real test of your drafting. Expensive life. Okay. Yeah. I think what people say is that they have all of these experiences of the letter of the law i n private practice, but it does become very different and exciting to see how the law applies in a really practical setting.

[00:12:52] So especially in a business environment, and you're talking about mobile phones and the regulatory aspects licensing, but really from a practical [00:13:00] point of view, and then talking about Richard Branson stunts and all the things that he likes to do. And then, yeah. how is legal involved in that?

[00:13:07] There are legal aspects to almost everything that we do in daily life. And so I think that a lot of people are tempted to shift out of private practice, to see what in-house looks like. And so you did actually move to Westpac, So how was that? 

[00:13:25] Danh Nguyen: Yeah, that was great. So as I said that Virgin mobile experience gave me a bit of a taste for, in-house. I also did another contract with a company called Lexmark after I finished Baker and McKenzie for about six months, again, that really gave me another sense of what it's like to be in house. And it was essentially just two legal counsel that, so it was great working in a very autonomous and had direct relationships with the senior leaders and senior managers so that was fantastic experience.

[00:13:50] It really gave me a sense in terms of Hey, what. would life in an in- house legal department look like? And so when the opportunity with Westpac came along I certainly didn't say no to it [00:14:00] and it was again, a great company to work for. Westpac at the time was very well known for its customer centricity.

[00:14:06] So they were really focused on what is the experience like for customers and making sure that customer experience is that seamless and it's as lovely as possible as delightful as possible in marketing terms, and so I think that translated to the employee experience.

[00:14:20] I think I had a great time being employee there and a really interesting work. Did some fantastic sort of deals in the ITC space negotiated, outsourcing deals with the likes of IBM and but also I started getting exposure to more general commercial work, not just ITC work.

[00:14:34] I did strategic alliances with companies like Visa and American Express and MasterCard. And with. rewards providers like companies that actually managed credit card rewards programs for Westpac. And that gave me a flavour of what general commercial work looks like and financial services in general sort of thing.

[00:14:48] So I started very gradually during the course of 18 months shifted over to being very much a financial services, general commercial sort of kind of lawyer. And that allowed me to develop a very good relationship with the guy who was heading up the unsecured finance department, which is very much the credit cards function team within Westpac.

[00:15:09] And I was seconded to that team for 18 months and there again, it took me away from the law one more time, but this time round, I wasn't being a lawyer. I was actually being a business development manager, a senior business development manager, and really gave me a sense of what it was like to be within the business, proper sort of thinking, understanding how P and L works. Excel files was no longer foreign to me. I had to learn what an Excel file looks like and I had to work that sort of thing. So yeah. It really gave me a sense of the business aspects of running being part of the business.

[00:15:41] Lara Quie: Lots of people who move in-house say that the most challenging aspect is the change in mindset that you need. What would you say was your change in mindset moving from Baker and McKenzie, and then into the different in-house functions that you had?

[00:15:57] Danh Nguyen: I think you need to take a step back [00:16:00] and take a much more holistic approach understanding what the business objectives and drivers of the business are.

[00:16:06] What is it trying to achieve? Who is it trying to reach out to? Who is it trying to connect with and you need to really do the homework to understand all those key drivers that affects how you run a business. Its customers, its products, its services, its operations.

[00:16:19] It's challenges its opportunities. And so once you've got a deep dive understanding of that Whatever legal counsel or advice that you provide is going to be irrelevant. It's necessarily have to be more relevant and more practical, right. And more tailored and customized to the particular unique circumstances of that company and its strategic objectives. I think that's a crucial thing. And when you're in a law firm, you try to, but you don't have the ability to actually piece the veil through, through, the company. You understand how it works and how the mind of the company works.

[00:16:52] Once you're inside that organization, especially the closer you get to the business, you really do get that sense and that, to my mind is a very [00:17:00] valuable lesson to be learned, I think and to become a better lawyer. I think that's part of the necessary journey you have to take I think. 

[00:17:06] Lara Quie: So, it sounds like at Westpac you were beginning to get more of an insight, as you say, into the sort of payment space and you saw relationships with Visa, MasterCard, et cetera, payment cards. So, tell me about your move into the Western Union company.

[00:17:24] Danh Nguyen: Yeah. I was with Westpac for about five years and then 2008 came around and I was talking with my partner and we were just thinking, what do we do next? And we went to Hong Kong for holiday and then we were catching up with friends and they just said they had just recently moved to Hong Kong from Australia, and they said, why don't you guys join us? And we just looked at each other, is that. Interesting. And then we went back and said, why not? It's like we're young I've always wanted to work overseas. I had tried to go to London a number of years earlier and it didn't work for whatever reason. And so here was an opportunity for us to go on a new adventure. So we started reaching out [00:18:00] to recruiters in Hong Kong and so we had a bunch of interviews when we were there had about three or four interviews just bang one after another sort of thing.

[00:18:09] And then I got the offer pretty much soon afterwards and a couple of weeks afterwards going okay. Lo and behold two and a half months later, I was in Hong Kong with Western Union. So that was just like a whirlwind actually how all that happened. Yeah. 

[00:18:22] Lara Quie: Yeah. Sounds like it was really meant to be. It's funny how these things just present themselves and then you were lucky to get a great role and obviously it was a great fit for you because you stayed with Western Union for many years. So, tell me about where you first joined and then how you progressed. 

[00:18:40] Danh Nguyen: Yeah, sure. So, I joined as a legal counsel within the team. There was a number of lawyers within teams led by essentially the head of legal for APAC who was my boss.

[00:18:49] She was a great mentor and boss manager. And so I did that for a year and a half or something like that and then I was promoted to become senior counsel after a couple of years. And then I had one or two direct [00:19:00] reports once I became senior counsel and then my, remit, it says the responsibilities for the region started with just Indochina in Philippines, that kind of area.

[00:19:08] And then it started steadily grew to pretty much most of the APAC. And then when she left four or five years after I joined Western Union, I was made the head of legal for Western Union for APAC.

[00:19:19] Lara Quie: So that was a really big step up and a really big responsibility. Yeah. So how many people did you have in your team at that time? 

[00:19:28] Danh Nguyen: So, I had about four lawyers and a couple of paralegals and my executive assistants. I had about a team about seven. 

[00:19:34] Lara Quie: And there were quite a lot of changes in the regulatory space because obviously more and more people were going online. Banking was becoming much more efficient and people were getting more comfortable with transferring money all over the world and certainly Western Union for Cross-border currencies was very much, especially in the developing countries very present. I imagine with all of the foreign workers sending money home, et [00:20:00] cetera. So what were the main challenges of your general counsel role? 

[00:20:04] Danh Nguyen: I think the biggest challenge was in navigating those complexities in terms of regulatory and the regulatory sort of framework and environment across all those jurisdictions across Asia, Pacific United. So we're looking at 39 jurisdictions and you had very mature markets like Australia, New Zealand, and then you got countries like South Korea and Japan with a unique set of challenges there. And then you've got emerging markets like the Philippines, Vietnam, Indonesia, and India being quite. And so I think it was just making sure that the regulatory approach that Western Union took was a sensible one that actually told us an interesting and dynamic narrative and story so that when you actually met with the regulators, you had a very compelling story to tell them that we are about financial inclusion. We want to increase financial literacy and inclusiveness and making financial services become more affordable and more accessible to those who can't afford it.

[00:21:01] And typically don't have access to it. Like a pre-lit Philippines, for example, I think it's some staggering figure that something like 80% or 90% of the population are unbanked, and so how do they actually access financial services? Access to, funds and things like that.

[00:21:14] And then of course, in a company like Western Union was able to plug that gap for them and be a lifeline really especially the number of Filipino workers overseas who send and remit money back home to their family and friends. 

[00:21:26] Lara Quie: Exactly. It's unbelievable when you say 39 different jurisdictions. All at different stages all with their own rules and regulations and trying to manage that at scale. And then thinking of all the millions of customers Western Union must have had, it must have been a really challenging time. But tell me about Wu way?

[00:21:46] Danh Nguyen: Wu Way, which is short for Western Union, of course. Basically I think at this point in time, Western Union was facing a number of challenges on a number of different fronts. They were being challenged by the challenger banks and as well as the new players in the [00:22:00] digital remittances space.

[00:22:01] And so essentially, a legacy company, Western Union really had to change and they knew it had to change and become a lot more digitized and really accelerate the changes. in terms of its operations and its culture because in order to compete effectively and efficiently with these new providers and new players it really had to change itself, and so the, CEO recognized that, and I think they engage McKinsey's to start really working with McKinsey very closely, to really figure out how they're going to actually do that. How are they going to transform themselves and really accelerate that change and that transformation and so that's how I got involved so he put together a team of 12 VPS across the globe. A cross functional team. Lawyers and compliance and marketing and business and finance and so on and we came together as a team very quickly.

[00:22:45] And we were tasked with really coming up with a new operating model and working very closely with the team at McKinsey and we working day and nights it was very hard work, as you can imagine. But really fulfilling, very rewarding, very challenging, because it was all new to us.

[00:23:00] Apart from the business focus, the finance box, it was very new to us in terms of all this stuff. Understanding operations. Understanding technology. What the technology stack looks like and what are the challenges, what are the issues with security and cybersecurity and customer needs and all those issues when you think about running a global business of the size of Western Union, it's very complex So we really as team members of the way we really had to come to grips and come up to speed on all those things quite quickly and to me that was a big step up and a big challenge, which I really relished.

[00:23:34] Lara Quie: Yeah. And I'm thinking though, at that point in time you were the general counsel and that was obviously a very responsible, full-on role. And, obviously as head of legal as well. That's quite a distinct mindset and a distinct function, but there was obviously something about you that the CEO had identified that knew that you would fit in while becoming effectively a management consultant in that space.

[00:23:59] So tell me, perhaps without being modest what are the things actually that even though you were general counsel that made you stand out in that way and get chosen? Yes. 

[00:24:09] Danh Nguyen: Yeah, I think it was a couple of things I think he and I already had a good relationship. Like we had spoken and met a number of times it's not like I never knew him. You're right. I was part of another pro sort of global project a few years earlier. So, he knew me from that as well. But, apart from that I think I did have the reputation for being someone who's very practical and very business-focused who collaborated really well across Asia Pacific, and I did get a really good reputation for someone who really. Rolled up their sleeves and got things done and was commercially focused obviously understanding the risks and making sure that those risks are effectively managed and mitigated, but at the same time, being a business enabler business partner and a trusted advisor to, my business colleagues across the region.

[00:24:54] And I think that really stood me in good stead intensive because I didn't want. To be a part of this team that were black letter, old school lawyers. They wanted lawyers to understand the business who has an interest in the business who has an interest in exploring and effecting change. So they really want people who are on board with that transformation sort of journey. And I think I definitely was very much on board with that sort of strategic goal. 

[00:25:18] Lara Quie: What would you say to in-house lawyers who are currently sitting in the business and getting to grips with all the practical side, but how can they really, get under the bonnet like that? What can you suggest in terms of the relationship with stakeholders? 

[00:25:36] Danh Nguyen: Yeah, I think that's a really good question. And I think there are different ways of doing it, but I think the best way of doing it is just to show your interest and ask and put your hands up. Look, Hey, I'm really interested in this.

[00:25:47] I would like to be involved in this and like eight out of 10 times, people will say, oh, that's really great that you're really interested in, yeah. That let me get you involved in this. I think the rare situations where they say, look, I don't want you to be involved in this so I think people are very [00:26:00] collaborative in that sense.

[00:26:00] And they really appreciate that lawyers actually show a real interest in the work that they do and, the goals that they have for the company. So, if you can show that interest early on. I think you start to build this trusted advisor relationship that I've mentioned earlier. And also, just looking for any opportunity for being involved in projects that maybe are not necessarily legal in nature.

[00:26:23] But gives you like a sense and, insights into how the business is run and what's important to the business. I think getting that exposure early on in your career and as much as possible, I think is important and really just remaining very curious about what you do and the world that you work, you live in and the work environment, I think remaining that, that sense of curiosity and asking questions and showing your interest I think will always stand you in good stead. I think then when you, when it comes to building these relationships and getting opportunities and being exposed to opportunities that give you access to interesting work, challenging work, and that will make you a better lawyer ultimately.

[00:27:00] Lara Quie: Yeah, that's really key. I think you mentioned being prepared to roll your sleeves up, being really curious, always learning. And it sounds like being approachable. I think one of the things that happens when private practice lawyers initially move in-house, they can feel a little bit alien to the business and it's quite important early on to be very approachable and asking questions.

[00:27:25] And as you say, really curious and show that interest because. I think there's naturally a division between the business and the legal, because sometimes the legal can be intimidating. Lots of people can be a bit perhaps too academic. And business people might feel, oh, I'm not really sure if I should approach them with this.

[00:27:47] So I think EQ is a really big part of being an effective in-house lawyer. So, you've obviously got very high EQ. What are the ways that you, think that you managed to nurture having good relationships and really developing those key relationships in the business?

[00:28:06] Danh Nguyen: Yeah, I think I learned early on that those relationships are super important and it's important to machine nurture those and sustain those because you never know because now even if they're in this role for the time being, but they'll move on somewhere else, but eventually things will come around and you will work with them again.

[00:28:21] So you need to continue. To nurture and sustain those relationships and really be helpful. Not just, as I said before, raise your hands. How can I help you? How can I make your job and your day better and easier? How can I help you? And so being that enabler and providing practical solutions options and I never saw myself as he's the lawyer he's just sitting outside of that. We saw myself as an integral part of that team. When I was working on something working on an initiative or a project. I never saw myself as outside of that. I was very, integral part of that team.

[00:28:52] And I think when they see there's no separation, at least as minimal separation as possible, of course, some situations where you have to preserve a degree of independence and objectivity, of course but for the most part if you plant yourself implant yourself into that team and see yourself as an essential, but normal average member of that team.

[00:29:11] There is no longer that separation and I think, people feel much more comfortable about opening up to you and sharing a lot more with you and sharing about their, goals for the next six months and 12 months and I was part of the executive leadership team across Asia Pacific. And that's how they trusted me because I didn't see them as being somehow trying to do something wrong. I was thinking, Hey, we're all trying to do the right thing here. We're all trying to achieve something. And wouldn't it be great if we actually collaborated working, cooperated, worked together to achieve whatever it is that you're trying to achieve.

[00:29:42] Lara Quie: Yeah, I think that's absolutely the key to it being part of the business, part of the team, all working together to achieve the successful outcomes. And not singling yourself out as the lawyer and being oh, I'm in the legal team and I only do legal. And if that hasn't got a legal question in it, I'm not interested that.

[00:30:05] But there was another move. It was a big, exciting thing to do. Tell me a bit about the move to London and then your move from Wu Way onto KorumLegal. 

[00:30:15] Danh Nguyen: Yeah, absolutely. As part of accepting that role and that challenge, they knew I had a desire to move to London know, so they knew that. So they offered it as part of the offer and said, yeah, we'll move you to London as well. I looked at it like it's a no brainer. So that was great. So they moved to London. I did that for another 18 months, two years and then if it's just the travel was too much. You know how it is the life of a management consultant, know, as you said, I was an in-house management consultant for Western Union and I was on the road all the time, every single week, I was back and forth to United States, to central America, to Lithuania, to other parts of Europe and Asia. And it's just like, it killed me, absolutely killed me. I don't know how the folks at meet McKinsey and BCG do it. I just don't know how they do it because that's not the life I want.

[00:31:04] I love travel, but I don't want to do it that much for work. I was literally on a plane. Almost every week, basically is just crazy, absolutely crazy. And it takes its toll on you on your, health, your physical fitness, but also your relationships and friendships as well.

[00:31:18] So it's not a healthy life to live for a long period of time. So I said, look enough is enough. I can't do this anymore. And so I exited on that basis, just knowing that I just can't do it for the longer term and it, because if I stayed, I just didn't know how long it's gonna last so that's something that I just couldn't face.

[00:31:35] And I had a break I had about three or four months break. So like a sabbatical, which is great I went to Bhutan that I'd always wanted to go to Bhutan and that was an incredible experience. And it just so create some separation between past job.

[00:31:47] And then during this time I had conversations with Titus who was a friend of mine a very close friend of mine and we had conversations off and on it's and somehow he managed to convince me that this is the right thing to do. And I just took a leap of faith.

[00:31:59] And actually because obviously it's a start-up company I'm not going into a company with established processes and systems and controls in place in, the way that big company It presents its own opportunities and challenges in terms of look, it's a small company it's nimble.

[00:32:15] It's very exciting. It's trying to do really exciting things, innovative things, and know trying to shake up the legal services industry. And to me, in a way, it's an extension of what I was doing at Western Union, it just in a smaller scale. And that's, I could see that, that what I was learning as part of the Wu Way at Western Union, I could somehow apply and be a part of KorumLegal to actually do the same. 

[00:32:34] And so that was the entry point. And I think and certainly the work I've been doing at KorumLegal certainly bears that out. We're trying to change things up and we're trying to challenge the way that things are done within the legal services sector. That there is another way there are options.

[00:32:48] There are better ways of doing things in there that we don't have to keep doing the things that we did 10, 20, 30 years ago that there are alternatives and we need to leverage better processes and technologies and looking at how do we [00:33:00] actually service our customers and provide a service that is a lot more practical, a lot more useful, a lot more customer centric. And to me, these are exciting things that should be part of every conversation that lawyers have with their customers and clients. 

[00:33:13] Lara Quie: Yeah, there's been a noticeable shift towards more and more work being done by the in-house team. The in-house teams are just overwhelmed, overstretched, and I think KorumLegal brings to the table a very unique, flexible on demand offering because it's not just secondments it's also managed legal services in the form of projects. Could you tell us an example of a, kind of a project that you've managed for an in-house team?

[00:33:43] Danh Nguyen: Yeah, of course there's a couple I can refer to we've done a bunch of regulatory assessments looking at FinTech companies products and services, and they want to enter new markets across Asia Pacific and of course they don't have a team there or they have a very small team. They don't have the resources to really devote to understanding what those regulations and rules and regulations are like. How would they apply to their products and services if they were to introduce those products and services to the markets? And so myself and the team really delved into those different regulatory regimes Did an assessment in practical terms and it's not a legal opinion because we're not a law firm, we don't provide legal opinions, but it's really just a practical business assessment of how those products and services might be regulated and what would the impact on the business and the operations for that business. If they were to introduce those products and if those products were to be caught by those regulations.

[00:34:35] So I think that's a very business centric looking at things and to delivering on the deliverable to the customer. And I think that's worked really well for us and we've done that sort of type of work for a number of different customers. The other thing is we also worked on this very big project for a customer who is in the online hotel reservations, accommodation booking service focused on Asia Pacific but they're part of a big global enterprise. And they were getting into the payment space but they've never done payments before so they were looking to develop their own payments solution their sort of in-house propriety payments.

[00:35:06] And they'd never done payments before. They don't know what AML compliance is. What it refers to, what are the requirements around that? What are the expectations of regulators? And they came to us to really help them start doing a bit of an assessment and an audit in terms of what the current state looks like in terms of their capabilities and what they would need to do and what the roadmap looks like for building out a compliance framework that would work and sustain them as part of this payments business that they're building. So, think and so that was a huge amount of work really from the building out a compliance framework from the ground up for them that was incredible experience I think and really rewarding work. And I involved a number of different consultants through the course of this project that lasted about 12 months. 

[00:35:46] Lara Quie: Yeah. It sounds like it's a pretty unique offering and so applicable because there are so many businesses currently pivoting, right? Our favourite word of COVID? But it really is that if you think of huge companies like Grab and Razor and all of these businesses in the technology space, which are very easily noticing that there are other opportunities and they are taking their customer base, think of Amazon customer base that they have, and then saying, wow, actually with these people, we could also do that and we might do this. And what does that look like? It lends itself to so much.

[00:36:28] And I think that many of those companies do want a business assessment. Like, Ooh, if we went into this, what would that look like at all? We're here in London and we're, looking at Asia Pacific and we're like, look at all those fantastic young people with their mobile phones. How can we get hold of them?

[00:36:45] And I think that is something that creates an opportunity for companies like KorumLegal to offer something a bit different, as you say, much more on the practical side and a lot more on the management consulting side, but in the legal space. So it's created a brand new area, in fact, it's about new law, genuinely new law, as in management consultancy law, risk assessment, law, project management, law, technology, innovation and efficiency law.

[00:37:18] So it is a brand-new space and there is a lot that can happen there. What kind of opportunities are you looking for currently in terms of if there are some FinTech companies listening to this podcast right now, what are the kinds of projects and work that you'd really like to attract?

[00:37:36] Danh Nguyen: We can definitely do a number of different things for these companies including look what does it look like to set up in a new country? Where do you want to enter a new market? What are the things that you should be looking out for in terms of operation, in terms of entity structure set up. What kind of rules regulations they need to be aware of the impact on customers operations. It's practical things like how do you source talent?

[00:37:58] How do you hire talent? And what are the requirements around that? Do the regulators expected you to have people on the ground? Things like that. All these practical things that when you go to a typical law firm, they don't know these things, they don't offer these things, but we can, because we know the markets we have an in-depth understanding of how the markets work, how the industry works and the sector of work in that market and how the regulators actually work and their approach to regulation.

[00:38:22] Having a much more 360 degree understanding of the, market expectations that requirement's really positioned as well to provide that sort of holistic business centric advice and counsel to FinTechs or start-ups who are looking to start up their operations in a new market a sense so we can do all the things, but then beyond that, we can do their general commercial work contracts review, drafting, negotiations, T's and C's, employment law agreements, consultancy agreements so there's a whole suite of things that we can do for these companies. It doesn't have to be outsourced to a law firm. It doesn't.

[00:38:56] And to the extent that you have a small in-house team let them do the [00:39:00] strategic, high value work. And the other stuff you can outsource to a more efficient and cost-effective sort of provider who can actually help you manage those things in a way that allows you to unlock capacity for your limited resources in-house. 

[00:39:14] Lara Quie: When you think back about there you were as a very young lawyer at Baker and McKenzie, would you ever have imagined that law would evolve in this way and that you would be the kind of lawyer that you are today? 

[00:39:29] Danh Nguyen: Never, never really and it's quite exciting and interesting to look back over the course of my 25 years career and really think that yes, a lot of things haven't changed and we get frustrated you and I are the same we are on the same side of the equation for that. There are a lot of things that haven't changed and it's frustrating that we see that, but at the same time, there's a bunch of things that have changed for the better and I think it's been largely driven by customer demand and customer behaviour and our customers, especially the savvy customers who are more business-minded who understand that there's a better way of doing things. That legal services doesn't have to be dry.

[00:40:07] It doesn't have to be boring, and it doesn't have to be divorced from the business and commercial contexts. In order to provide effective relevant commercially minded legal advice and solutions you need to understand and be a part of the business conversation and be part of that conversation.

[00:40:25] So I think to my mind, that's a great shift and something that is irreversible, it has to be irreversible, and we can't go back to the old ways I think, and that drive for relevance and sense of practicality will always be the drivers for us at KorumLegal for example, because we want to listen to our customers and we want to provide solutions that is tailored to what they're looking for when they talk to us.

[00:40:49] Lara Quie: Thanks for being on the show today, Danh, where can people reach you if they want to connect? 

[00:40:55] Danh Nguyen: Yeah, of course so they can call me or danh.ngyuyen@korumlegal.com. So happy to have a conversation with them. 

[00:41:03] Lara Quie: Brilliant. Thank you so much for being on the show today, Danh.

[00:41:07] Danh Nguyen: Thanks very much, Lara that was great. I really enjoyed that.