Goodwin Chief Operating Officer Mary O’Carroll has been named one of the top 20 intrapreneurs of the last two decades by Financial Times. The prestigious list honors individuals who have contributed to the rise in status of business professionals in law firms and operations experts in corporate legal departments. Mary and the other honorees were recognized at the FT Innovative Lawyers 20th Anniversary Global Summit in London on June 24th.
The Financial Times noted Mary’s leadership in building the Corporate Legal Operations Consortium (“CLOC”), a members’ forum that aims to lift the role of in-house operations professionals, which she helped found while working at Google. CLOC’s membership grew from 40 to 3,000 members during her five-year tenure as President, CEO, and Board Member.
Based in the firm’s Silicon Valley office, Mary oversees Goodwin’s Global Operations (GO) team of more than 1,000 business professionals globally. She is responsible for developing and executing on transformational objectives and operational strategies, controls, and procedures aligned with the firm’s overall direction and goals. She partners with the firm’s Chief Officers who lead the Finance, Client Development, Innovation and Information Technology, Information Security, Marketing and Communications, Practice Management, and Talent and Administration functions.
Prior to Goodwin, Mary served as the Chief Community Officer at Ironclad, Inc., a leading contract management software company, where she drove strategic direction and operational excellence. Before that, Mary spent 13 years at Google. In this role, she built out Google’s Legal Operations function, focused on strategic priorities, technology innovation, and implementation of processes and procedures to drive business results.
Mary’s work and innovation with Google, CLOC, and Ironclad were the subjects of two Harvard Law School case studies. She has been previously recognized as a leader and innovator by the Financial Times (Champion of Generative AI Innovation), the American Bar Association (Women of Legal Tech; Legal Rebel), LegalTech News (Legal Department Operations Director of the Year), and the San Francisco Business Times (Inspire Award).