Nicole Jones
Lincoln Financial Group
Senior Vice President and General Counsel
For Nicole Jones, becoming general counsel has introduced a whole new dimension to her career as a corporate attorney. “Suddenly, you look around and realize that the buck stops with you,” she says. “Your responsibilities to the corporation are very different. You now play a much larger role in its success. It’s more important than ever to focus on the right issues; and with all that that entails, it’s vital to manage your time smartly.”
Since being named GC at Lincoln in May, Jones has become very familiar with financial legislation and reform; the company’s variety of financial products and services; and her 200-person legal department, traveling to various locations to meet almost all of its members. “It’s been an amazing transition,” she says. “The department and my peers have been very welcoming, and my boss [CEO Dennis R. Glass] has been incredibly supportive and willing to be just as involved as I’ve needed him to be.”
Lincoln is headquartered in Philadelphia not far from where Jones grew up in southern New Jersey. Always a self-motivated student, she set her sights on a law career while still in high school and never veered from that path. “Looking back, I really knew nothing about what it meant to be a lawyer,” she recalls. “Luckily when I went to law school at NYU, I liked it; and when I summered with a firm and learned about corporate law upclose, I liked it even more.”
Was GC a longtime goal for Jones? “Yes, and no,” she answers. “At a firm, almost everyone wants to be a partner; when you go in-house, GC looks great. But for the longest time I felt very far away from those positions. They were things that I distantly aspired to, however, as you ascend in a firm or company, working more closely with its leaders, you gain the confidence that you could actually sit in those chairs. That’s how it was for me.”
Before joining Lincoln, Jones was at CIGNA Corporation where she served as deputy general counsel. Prior to that she served in positions at Johnson & Johnson, Davis Polk & Wardell, MCI, and International Paper Corporation. Jones’ hope for the future is that she and her department will continue to be valued by the company as a business partner known for coming at an issue from a legal angle but also for offering good business advice. “In addition to my broad experience, it’s that desire to partner with the business and to bring excellent service to our clients that makes me an asset to the organization. I want people to ask my input even when it’s not a legal matter.”
Looking back on her career to date, Jones admits that she would have never mapped things out the way it has unfolded. “But every step has turned out to be a building block for where I am now. Even the assignments I dreaded were beneficial. My advice [to young lawyers] is to grab any opportunities that come your way. In the end, you’ll have no regrets.”
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From the September/October 2010 issue of Diversity & Bar®