Charles Simmons left Shearman & Sterling LLP in 2000, joining Bristol-Myers Squibb Co. as an M&A lawyer to help get big deals done. And so he did: Within his first 12 months on the job, the restructuring healthcare giant sold its Clairol hair and beauty business to Procter & Gamble Co. for $5 billion, spun off its Zimmer Corp. subsidiary into a $5 billion public company and bought E.I. du Pont de Nemours & Co.'s pharmaceutical business for $8 billion. Two years later, Simmons took over the corporate development group.
The move from outside legal counsel to in-house lawyer and then lead dealmaker meant transitioning from a pure execution role to "thinking much more strategically about deals," says Simmons. But he'd been preparing for the opportunity since his days at the law firm.
"It was always important to me to put myself in the shoes of the person I was providing a service to. I wasn't just approaching it as a lawyer. The first 30% to 40% of my work was what are the goals of the M&A person doing the deal and how can I help them achieve them. That made it easier to go into a role here because I already had in mind what kept the business people up at night." - Suzanne Stevens
Join Corporate Dealmaker's LinkedIn forum
Juergen Lasowski
And the winners are...
