Cynthia Cole has had a rare level of legal and business experience. Aside from being a former general counsel to three companies, Cole has also taken a turn in the chief executive’s chair. But she got that latter role through tragedy.
On May 25, 2016, Spectra7 Microsystems Inc. Chief Executive Officer Tony Stelliga, 55, suffered a heart attack and died. One day later, Cole, who had served as Spectra7’s general counsel since December 2015, was named co-interim CEO along with Chief Financial Officer Dave Mier. She served in that role for four months, and during her short tenure, she delivered financial results presentations, went to investor conferences, fielded difficult questions and steered the company into a year of exceptional growth. On March 9, 2017, Spectra7 announced its fiscal results for 2016. The microchip developer posted revenue of $8.6 million, a 104 percent increase from the year prior.
Cole, who also kept the GC role throughout her time as co-CEO, joined Baker Botts in March 2017. She recently spoke with ALM about being launched into the CEO role, what she learned and how her legal training affected her tenure. The following transcript has been edited for clarity and length.
ALM: What did it feel like on the first day, when you both found out your CEO had passed and that you were named interim co-CEO?
Cynthia Cole: The first issue we addressed was how to announce to the rest of the team, to the rest of the employees, some of whom had known Tony for 15 years and worked with him at different companies. That was really my first thought: How am I going to announce to this team that Tony has passed away? And that was extremely emotional for me.
I had a very short night, that night, and was back at the office by probably 6:30 in the morning to make that announcement. I didn’t think about how I would run the company or what I would do. It was just getting through announcing to the employees and regrouping. That was the first thing.
That happened right before Memorial Day weekend, so it was a long weekend, and so I cried a lot. I was sad. Tony was a unique person and I was learning a lot from him. It was a personal loss, it was a loss for the company, it was a professional loss and so, I cried a lot. On Tuesday morning, driving back to the office, I was shaking from nerves. I thought: "OK, that’s it, I’ve got to run this company now, so what are we going to do?"
The first thing was regrouping with the executive team and deciding how were we going to move forward, what were we going to do, and what were the priorities for the quarter and the priorities for the year. It was about getting back down to business. I think, as a lawyer, you are trained to, in some ways, disassociate the emotional from the practical. You have to get down to business, you have to understand: "OK, what is the outcome that we are planning for, and what are the steps that we need to take to get there?" That’s what I did.
ALM: Did your legal training, where you’re taught to spot risk and be risk-averse, affect your run as interim co-CEO?
CC: You hit the nail right on the head—yes. Traditionally, a CEO executes and a general counsel advises. Those lines have been blurring more and more in the last decade and the general counsel’s role is changing inside companies and has been for a long time. I have always viewed my role as general counsel as one where I have worked in tandem with the CEO, anticipating, looking and spotting the risks. … My approach has always been that the best way to do that is to fully understand the business.
I’ve always worked very closely with finance, with sales, with engineering, with operations, with product, so that my view is a large view of the company and of where the company is going. That’s what helped me take over as CEO, the fact that I had always worked very closely with Tony and I knew what the issues were, and I was helping him address those issues.
But then I had to move from [how] the general counsel always works, in the background. Hopefully, you never hear of the general counsel’s successes. That’s kind of the point. You shouldn’t be in the spotlight. It was intimidating to move into the foreground and be in the spotlight.
ALM: Is there anything that surprised you about the job, either in how quickly you took to it, or how difficult it was?
CC: One of the most difficult things I found was, frankly, taking calls from investor groups and people digging for information. That was, I would say, where my legal instincts were the highest. I was extremely cautious, whereas a CEO would have been much more able to walk that fine line. One of the things that I took to and really enjoyed was being a leader, leading the team, driving the different initiatives, and executing. I have been told that I’m fearless. And that may be true [laughs].
ALM: What did you learn from your term as CEO that you will use in your new job as special counsel to clients?
CC: It helps me relate to the different pressures and needs that the clients have. When you’re general counsel, you can somewhat say: "OK, this is a legal issue and this is a business issue." You can bifurcate issues. When you are CEO, there is no bifurcation. They’re all your issues.
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