Business Circle: Mr. Doho, you are Head of Legal Operations at PPRO – can you give us a brief outline of how you got to do what you do now and why you chose PPRO in particular.
Jean-Philippe Doho: I studied Law in France and the US focusing on Corporate Law and Intellectual Property. I worked for world leading video game editor Ubisoft for 7 years, first as a Legal Counsel, then as a Legal Innovation Manager in the newly created Legal Innovation Team. During that time I studied Innovation by Design at ENSCI les Ateliers (design school) to apply innovative methodologies to law projects. I joined PPRO at the end of 2022 as Head of Legal Operations.
I chose PPRO because of the great product they offer to merchants and PSP to allow secure and fast payment for customers. Fintech companies were always interesting to me as a next step towards highly innovative business that constantly evolve to the world demands. Being an expat in Berlin I felt very close with a lot of tech people, designers, developers, crypto investors so this was a logical move for me.
BC: What are the special challenges as a legal counsel in a company that specializes so much in digitalization and international business?
Doho: One of the main challenges is to find processes and documents that fit to different parts of the company (IT, Commercial, Compliance, Product) in different areas of the world with different ways of doing business with clients. You can see this in how we sign documents, how we store them, how we share them with clients, how we negotiate.
We have to look at our team's user journey, at data from our tools and come up with solutions that fit everyone (or most people) and most importantly that benefit the customers.
BC: As Head of Legal Operations, what are the most important future and development projects in your company?
Doho: We are working on a Generative AI project that I am really excited about. I will talk more about it during the conference on how that project came about. Using AI in such an innovative company as PPRO makes sense but it also requires important resources (budget, employees, testing, focus group, value chain) and commitment from the whole organization. We also have to decide if we are developing tools targeted at reducing manual work internally or generating money externally.
The renewal of our CLM tool will be an important negotiation. Finally we are keen to keep working with designers on legal content (legal process, legal documents).
For all those development projects using Strategy Design helps us align with the company goals and create value.
Companies should focus on their employees‘ qualities and passions outside of work
BC: What could a traditional, established company learn from a start-up culture to be successful in the war for talents?
Doho: I strongly believe it all starts with recruitment. There has always been this chat about the "start up culture" which big companies are trying to give to their employees. I used to work at Ubisoft, an international 20k+ employees company that always had a "do it yourself" culture as it was in an innovative field that is video games. I always had an entrepreneurial mindset, always had extracurricular activities. I really do not like this term as it diminishes the value of these activities/responsibilities on someone's life. Companies should in my opinion focus on exploiting these qualities and passions that employees develop outside of work. I think people will be more engaged, agile in their work, and recommend their company if they feel they are exploiting all their potential.
BC: What advice would you give to your 10-year-younger self if you started studying law today?
Doho: Keep cultivating your innovative approach. Start coding and invest more in Africa.
BC: What impulse should come from your workshop, in which way do you want to change the mindset of your audience?
Doho: It is not always about the budget, it is more about how differently you can approach a topic. My personal story within the legal innovation field has been about creating opportunities from being passionate about change to make things better. From awareness videos on data privacy, document storage with better user experience, making legal documents more appealing, Gen AI at PPRO, you can always look for ways to make the lawyers and their stakeholders life better no matter where you start, as long as you look at the full picture.
BC: Finally, something personal: Is this your first time in Vienna and what are you most looking forward to?
Doho: Yes, it is my first time visiting Vienna. As an architecture fan I am looking forward to seeing the city and trying local food. I have a tradition now that whenever I visit a town I go to the local Design museum to inspire myself on practices in that country/town. So the MAK museum is on my list if I have a moment to go. Of course as a classical music fan I am looking to buy some records too and visit Mozart's house.
BC: Dear Jean-Philippe, we would like to thank you for this conversation and look forward to welcome you in Vienna!
Jean-Philippe Doho is Head of Legal Operations at PPRO and Advisory Board member of the Global LegalTech Hub. He is also a guest lecturer on Legal & Design for the IMM Leadership Program. He was previously a Legal Counsel/Legal Innovation Manager at Ubisoft Entertainment in Paris and Berlin.
Auf der Vienna Legal Innovation am 16./17. April hält er einen englischsprachigen Workshop zum Thema: Strategy Design & Legal
