4 Tips from Uber GC Sally Yoo

I’ve heard time and again how lawyers can help their career by researching and emulating successful lawyers without a formal mentorship. In that vein, I encourage you to listen to the podcast interview of Sally Yoo, GC of Uber, as she shares her insights on how she got to where she is. Here are 4 take-aways:

1. If you’re unsure about whether to interview, go ahead and do the interview. Do your best (she prepped for hours and did a mock interview with her spouse the night before for a job she wasn’t sure about), and then decide. (Spoiler alert: she got the job and took it.)
2. Ask yourself the right question when presented with an opportunity. With Uber, Sally considered the job by first weighing pros and cons but then realized the right question to ask herself was when the next time she would be offered a GC job. Since she was a law firm partner over 40, the answer was never, which spurred her to take the job.
3. Dream bigger. Do set a 3 year plan, but make sure you are dreaming big. Sally blew through growth expectations for her team in the first year, so her takeaway is to dream bigger.
4. Solve your client’s problems, which are all business problems. Law is the specialty tool to help solve them.