Robin H. Sangston

Cox Communications
Vice President of Legal Affairs and Chief Compliance Officer

Long before Robin Sangston became the legal leader of a major cable television and telecommunications provider headquartered in Atlanta, she was a young girl who loved to visit her dad at work. Her father was the announcer for Meet the Press, and Sangston vividly remembers spending many Sunday mornings at a Washington, D.C., television studio watching from the sidelines as powerbrokers of the day—President Carter, Henry Kissinger, and Zbigniew Brzezinski among them—gave their opinions on the latest political topics. It was then that she first realized the power of media—awareness that would only increase over the years.

Sangston joined Cox Communications in 1995. Prior to that, she was a litigation attorney at Dow Lohnes, a D.C.-based media boutique firm, for six years (her first job after graduating from George Washington University School of Law). “Dow Lohnes had been the go-to firm for Cox for nearly a hundred years,” explains Sangston. “Because my newspaper and broadcasting clients included Cox Enterprises, I was familiar with the family-owned company’s culture. Also, I had a regulatory background; cable TV is one of the most regulated businesses [in the country]. So when Cox decided to branch out into cable TV and needed a litigation person, I was, in many ways, an obvious choice.”

Sangston is a strong believer in the benefits provided by good timing. When first offered a job at Cox, she jumped at the opportunity to be part of a new department in a growing company, and subsequently worked hard to move up and take on a leadership role. At her then-boss Jim Hatcher’s request, Sangston became involved with Women in Cable (WIC) in order to learn more about all facets of the industry. As the national association’s president, she gained valuable knowledge about budget planning and strategy, agenda setting, and how to prudently consider widely divergent viewpoints—skills that would prove helpful in Sangston’s ascent to her current senior legal position.

In addition to managing the day-to-day concerns and sizable budget of her thirty-person department, Sangston still likes to be a part of Cox’s bigger litigation matters. “I definitely have a competitive side,” she confides. “For me, strategizing to put the company in the best place possible is very enjoyable. Intrinsically I respond to the winner-take-all nature of litigation.”

Today, Cox Communications is much more than a cable TV provider. “My job is always changing,” notes Sangston. “Along with the company’s new offerings—telephone, broadband, wireless—comes another level of regulatory scrutiny. What’s more, the wireless industry is the third-most litigious in the country; class-action lawsuits based on billing practices are common. And on top of that, new services like interactive advertising open an entire new set of privacy issues.”

Looking back, Sangston had no idea when she set her sights on a career in media law that she was choosing such an incredibly dynamic practice area: “The decision was a good one,” she concludes. “There hasn’t been a single boring day in my entire career, and the future looks equally exciting.”

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From the July/August 2010 issue of Diversity & Bar®