>> Ed Freitag: I'm Ed Freitag.
I've had a career as corporate lawyer, mostly
using house counsel for large corporations.
>> Can you describe what your duties were?
>> Ed Freitag: Yes.
As a lawyer for a corporation, provide legal
advice to the company and its officers,
helping them in a variety of matters whether
it be compliance or litigation or planning
for ongoing activities of the company.
You have a broad exposure to lots
of different disciplines depending
on the size of the company that you're with.
I began my career as an inside counsel after
having worked at a law firm for several years.
And wanted to have some different
challenges and found a job with a company
where I was 24 years before I left
there and went someplace else.
I really enjoyed the variety of the job.
The challenges varied from day to day and
as the company grew the challenges changed.
It depends, of course, where you're working.
But working with one company
and getting to know the people
and learning the business was really--
excited me about the job and seeing
the company grow and become successful.
What you really need to be successful as
a corporate lawyer is a couple things.
One is a great grasp of the
basics of being a lawyer.
But in addition, you really have to
listen closely to what your clients want,
understand the business, help them
get to a solution and also be able
to express yourself very clearly
so that they understand the choices
that they are required to make.
Obviously to be-- to start off
you have to go to law school,
but in addition to that I think it's important
to have some basic understanding of business.
A course in accounting is very
important just so you understand the nuts
and bolts behind what there is in the company.
And again, a lot of writing, being able
to communicate well both orally
and in writing is important.
>> What are your hours like in the
office versus out of the office?
Were you able to work from home?
>> Ed Freitag: The hours really varied
depending on what was happening at the time.
There may be-- there may have been lots of
days where I could just have a regular 9:00
to 5:00 job, but there are other days
when I spend many hours at the office.
Depending on the company you can do some work at
home, especially given today's communications.
Teleconferencing, email, faxes,
Blackberries, being at home is just like being
at the office though there really is no
substitute for the real face to face contact,
being able to walk around and
talk and just drop in and talk
to people and find out what's going on.
I always found that that was the
best way to learn about the company
and what was happening was just
to drop by somebody's office.
>> Were you able to travel a
lot or did you have to travel?
>> Ed Freitag: I did a lot of
traveling, but again it depends
on the company you're working for.
The company I worked for I had
a lot of international business
so I basically traveled all around the world.
I was in Australia and New Zealand, in Europe
and Brazil, South America, Central America.
I guess the only place I didn't go was Asia,
but other people I've worked with did travel
to Asia, but again it depends
on the company you work for.
>> Any final advice?
>> Ed Freitag: My final advice to people
would be if you're interested in working
with a company, learning about what
a company is about and having--
if you have an interest in business working for
a corporation as a lawyer is a great opportunity
to handle a lot of different matters.