Scaling Legal Operations with Stan Shepard at Atlassian Team ’24 Europe

This is Textron tv. Hi, I'm Mitch Ashley. We are here in Barcelona at Atlassian, team 24 in Europe, Barcelona, as I said.

So we are turning the direction towards really where Atlassian is headed, which is how do other parts of the organization, non-technical, the business parts of the business leverage at Atlassian Technologies. No better place to start than in the legal team. So I'm joined by Stan Shepherd, who is General Counsel with Atlassian.

Welcome. Thank you, Mitch. Great to be here.

Great. Do we need to give any, uh, legal disclosures before we Talk? I, I think we're good.

We're good. Okay. All right.

There's some fine print somewhere. There's some fine print. We'll put that on in production.

Okay. Just teasing. Well, well, first of all, tell us a little bit of your background.

You've been with lasting for 10 years, so I have Have a bit of history going in here, but tell us your background. Yeah, It's been a fun ride last team. Absolutely.

So, joined Atlassian a decade ago. Um, it was a very different company at the time. Um, I'd say, you know, still very much in startup mode.

Pre IPOI was the fourth or fifth person on the legal team. Um, definitely it was about building, uh, from, from scratch. Uh, so really I came in to set up their commercial contracts function, um, and, and really understand sort of how do we add some discipline to the contracts that we're signing from simple, you know, what forms are we using?

Uh, has a lawyer reviewed the form before someone signs it, and then where are we keeping our contracts? Right? When I got here, people were signing 'em with wedding signatures, keeping 'em in a filing fold, you know, filing folder.

Uh, some were in Dropbox, some were on cofluent, some were in email. So really just trying to get some discipline, uh, from that. Um, fast forward a couple years, GDPR came around.

Uh, and so I was there to really help mature that privacy function and instill privacy by design, uh, so that we're truly meeting the not only compliance needs, but also what our customers are expecting, uh, from a data use data governance perspective. Um, and then I got the opportunity about three years ago to step into the GC position and really own the, the full legal lifecycle from soups to nuts. Um, and that was an opportunity of a lifetime.

Um, so here I am. Uh, we have a hundred person legal team around the world, uh, and sort of a follow the sun approach to, uh, to, to, to really serving internal Atlassian customers as well as our, our, you know, 300,000 customers that we have globally and some here, here in Barcelona. I imagine intellectual property is a big part of your Absolutely.

Yep. Yep. So broadly, we have a commercial function.

We have an IP function, we have a, a corporate, uh, function, uh, includes m and a employment, things like that. Um, we also have a, uh, a privacy function, a product council function, really a a centralized hub for product teams to get all of their, you know, legal needs met. We have a legal operations function, which I think we'll probably be talking quite a bit about technology later today.

Um, and then we also have a, a policy government affairs function as well. Um, putting also aside legal, uh, I also have a, a, a sustainability team, uh, very much focused on, on our environmental, uh, and social impact, as well as, uh, Atlassian philanthropic foundation, um, that's also within my portfolio. So, uh, sort of a, a fun, um, really incredible team that, uh, that really I, I think is laser focused on delivering value to our customers.

Very good. Well, let's, let's turn the tables. You as a user or, you know, quasi customer, internal customer, if you will, talk about how you use Atlassian products Yeah.

In your, in your legal operations. Sure. So I think we're super users of Atlassian products, and I love talking about it because I really think that, you know, our motto is run legal, like a business, really embrace sort of the innovation and the technology, uh, that, that Atlassian is doing for, for all of its customers.

I also love the fact that, you know, we are, I like to say sort of non-technical users, right? We're, we're savvy, we have a craft, but we're not sort of hands-on keyboards, uh, programmers. And so the fact that we can use Atlassian products really out of the box and help with, you know, configure the workflows to best suit our needs and what our customers internally and externally need, uh, I think just shows the power, uh, and the extensibility of, of the Atlassian products.

So lemme give you a couple examples. Um, first and foremost, we use Confluence as our knowledge base. Uh, so think of that as sort of, oh, a wiki on steroids.

Uh, we keep our, uh, legal forms there. It's sort of that repository for the latest and greatest forms. Uh, we also have some self-serve information.

So business customers, product teams, uh, HR teams can come read a page. They don't actually have to talk to a lawyer on the team. It's a checklist.

They get the information, it, their off and running, uh, and they can do it at their own time. That's another really great use of Confluence. Uh, and now with Atlassian intelligence on top of, or in, in, you know, included in, uh, confluence, um, we're just incredibly, uh, I would say more efficient and more productive in language, right?

And think about how legal is so text heavy. We deal with a lot of technical, uh, and, and very sort of, um, lengthy documents. And so think about the, the power of gen AI to summarize, to translate, to, uh, make la uh, you know, documents more concise, um, really change the tone.

So I love to think of legal as being really that, that power user of, of Atlassian intelligence. You know, every every business department is gonna have their own kind of unique requirements if it's marketing or finance or legal. Yeah.

I'm curious your thoughts on ai, generative ai and the use of it in a legal context. Yeah. What are some of the, are there some unique considerations you have to make about ai?

Yeah, absolutely. So I mean, I think we approach it very responsibly, very ethically, very transparently. Um, you know, I think there's some incredible use cases that we're already seeing savings from a productivity and a time, uh, perspective.

Uh, one example I'll give you is Jira. We have a legal service desk that is our intake. Think of it as a, a, a front door for legal, uh, for, for our help.

Uh, and that's within Atlassian, uh, 12,000 employees. Um, can, can open a legal service desk. We used to have to go through that queue of tickets each morning, and we had a 30 minute standup, um, where we were actually saying, okay, is this an employment issue?

Is this a, you know, a, a a a contract issue? Is this an IP issue? Now, AI does all that automate automation for us, and it actually will know what is in the content of a ticket and can assign that out.

So think about saving a 30 minute standup each day, all because of ai. Um, moving on to sort of more the, the ethical and, you know, sort of the responsible use of technology. This is something that's near and dear to my heart and something that the team and I have been really been focused on and I think differentiates ourselves in the marketplace.

And that is that, um, we believe that it's a, a, a very awesome responsibility to be a provider of ai, and that we have to do it in that sort of very transparent way. One of our company values, as you know, is, um, you know, open company, no bs. And so this is very much a values aligned proposition.

Uh, about a year ago we published our Responsible Tech principles. Those are on our website. Um, I encourage people to check those out.

And that really was borrowing from some, you know, I think concrete and fundamental privacy, uh, uh, uh, principles that, that we stood up for for GDPR. But it's all about does the customer understand when AI is turned on? Do the end users have con uh, uh, agency, uh, and an ability to toggle on and off?

You know, are they in control, uh, of that? And do they understand how their data's being used? When is the data being used for model training?

Is it being used for single instances? Is it being used cross, uh, customer instances? Those are all things that we really feel like any company that is providing AI needs to do in a very open and transparent way.

So, um, again, as sort of a, within my GC circle, uh, people really are looking to Atlassian to teach them, uh, 'cause we're, they, they really see us as, uh, an early adopter and a company that they want to emulate from a responsible tech principle. Yeah, you should, you should be able to use the products or know how to use it so you can help them understand it makes total Sense. Exactly.

Yeah. Yeah, for sure. Um, so, uh, again, that, that sort of responsible tech, uh, principle as well as, uh, a template that we have, and that actually went into the designing of rvo, our, our internal engineering teams went through that checklist that, you know, the legal team, uh, developed.

Uh, and really that was one of the guides to sort of say, are we shipping products that we think, you know, meet that sort of higher bar ethically, uh, and are gonna meet the regulatory bar? So one of the things that I also wanna sort of talk to you about, Mitch, is, um, you know, we see some, uh, really interesting and smart AI regulation coming on the horizon, especially here in Europe. Yeah.

The European Union, like in most cases, is usually ahead of the game when it comes to, to, uh, regulation of, of technology. We at Atlassian fully support regulation of technology done in a very smart and I think very business, business centric way. Uh, and so just two weeks ago, we signed on to the EU AI pact, which was a voluntary, you know, um, early way to show our support for legislation that's coming, uh, in, in, in the year ahead.

Uh, so really something that I think I'm proud of and, and really can stand behind, um, and, and say, Hey, Atlassian is doing well for our customers when it comes to ai. It's the old regulatory front's a little challenging because some ways we might be rushing ahead to put regulatory frameworks in place before we understand it. The other hand, we don't want it to get escape, you know?

Yeah. Get out of the Lab. It's a balancing act To use that expression.

So there's a, there's a balance in what we want to achieve. Absolutely. Well, that's why I think, you know, the partnership between government and industry is so important that, um, you know, we really want to be part of a dialogue and we want to, um, you know, provide feedback on legislation and say, you know, is this accomplishing what the legislators think it's gonna accomplish?

Um, you know, how easy or specific is it, uh, or how practical is it for a company like Atlassian or another, uh, software company to implement the legislation? If I read the legislation, is it obvious what you're, you know, asking us to do? Um, and, uh, you know, again, just tying it to outcomes.

Is it actually achieving, uh, what we think as a civil society and, you know, sort of a, a world that we wanna live in? Um, you know, is it actually achieving those, those end results? So If you had to kinda roll, roll things back and share maybe what a few of the lessons learned for you, if you're gonna share with another legal organization Yeah.

Looking you to implement Atlassian Technologies, what are some of those lessons you've, you would, you would part knowledge with? Yeah, I mean, I, I, I think first and foremost is don't let perfect, uh, you know, like get, get in the way of good. I think it's really important to just experiment and try new things.

Uh, we very much are a company, uh, that is a, a learning company. Um, I actually come from a family of educators. Uh, everyone in my family is not a lawyer.

They come from education. So that's a, a space that I'm very comfortable in. And so I really encourage my, my team and other, you know, legal teams externally to just jump into the deep end.

Obviously, you know, don't do anything too crazy. But, um, you know, it doesn't have to be a perfect solution. And I think iterating over time and learning what works, you know, where are you getting results?

Where maybe was your hypothesis not being proved from a technology perspective, uh, I think is a really good, um, fir first principle. Uh, secondly, I would say, um, you know, really focus on who your end client is and, and sort of that obsession with customer value that, that a legal team needs to deliver. 'cause after all, we are a service industry.

Um, and so really understanding the persona of who you're serving, uh, I think is a important success metric when it comes to, you know, leveraging technology and tooling. Um, so those are maybe just some quick, I, I think sort of top, top things that I've gleaned over the last decade here at Atlassian. Um, and, you know, I think are, are just important, um, guiding principles, Sometimes just defining what success looked like.

Yeah. Is that simple idea starting. Yep.

Not always easy, but that helps a lot, lot too, And being okay with evolving that, because maybe success at stage one is one thing, but then over time you really wanna advance that and, and evolve it. Uh, and your customers might evolve too. So you really have to have that feedback loop going where you're okay getting feedback and they're in a safe space to deliver that feedback to you.

Very nice. Yeah. Well, you're a great representative for the legal profession and using Atlassian products too, and Thank you.

I'm sure a big help to the company, so thanks for sharing that with our audience. Absolutely. My pleasure.

Anything in the future happening for you? There's a lot of things on the front. What's the next big project for legal at?

Good question at last. Yeah. Um, you know, I think for, for us, it's, it's all about scaling.

Um, and just really making sure that we're looking two to three to five years out. Um, because I think the legal profession is evolving. Uh, obviously Atlassian and our business is moving fast.

Um, and so we just sort of wanna see around corners and we wanna be prepared. Uh, so, you know, I think part of it is understanding where, uh, the business is going and, and being sort of in lockstep with them. Um, so AI is definitely, I think that the thing that's top of mind for me, um, and just, you know, understanding all the different tools that we can use, uh, starting with our first party, first party tools, but then we're also really evaluating third party tools as well, because we really understand that there's this whole ecosystem of legal tech.

Uh, Atlassian definitely has a, a role to play in that, but there's other vendors out there, um, you know, vendor billing with our law firms, um, contracts, uh, negotiation. There's really just, I think a, a huge wave that we wanna ride. Um, and so we, we love just, you know, being, being on that wave.

Yep. Customers do have other applications and providers, for sure. Yeah.

Yeah. Thank you. It's great talking with you.

Yeah, you too, Mitch. Take care. Thanks.

All righty. Uh, great having Stan Shepherd, uh, general counsel here at Atlassian, and, uh, come back. We'll have some more videos for you tomorrow.