Danielle Johnston Holmes (Associate General Counsel of Patents at Microsoft Corporation) talks with Jason Barnwell (Assistant General Counsel of Legal Business, Operations, and Strategy at Microsoft Corporation) and offers an incredibly thoughtful retrospective on her 21 year tenure at Microsoft, including: why partnership with outside counsel matters [1:55]; her work leading patent portfolio development [3:00]; recent strategy shifts and how they scale their business [4:20]; what prompted them to invest in outside counsel feedback processes [7:05]; the cultural challenges in delivering feedback to and having hard conversations with outside counsel [8:30]; the patent team’s outside counsel management committee and applying a data-driven approach [10:30]; the value of visiting your partners on their turf [14:50]; how she came to Microsoft [16:40]; how she was introduced to diversity in the legal profession [17:50]; investing D&I is good for your career and the importance of building relationship networks beyond the day job [21:15]; working part time and advancing her career [24:30]; how she defines success beyond the corporate ladder [28:55]; her recipe for resilience [31:15]; why she retired from Microsoft [41:20].
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