Kerry L Childe
CHAIR, ITPEC
Kerry Childe is senior corporate counsel, privacy and information policy, for Best Buy. She has been with Best Buy since July 2014. Prior to that, she was the senior privacy and regulatory counsel at a nonprofit financial services company in Austin, Texas, and before that she was the associate general counsel for a small publicly-traded company in central Texas.
What interested you in the in-house practice of law and how did you come to be an attorney at Best Buy?
I have always been in-house; I’ve never been in private practice. When I was much younger, my father and stepmother were the two partners in a law partnership, and that solidified my desire to have only one client and to be able to really learn their business. As for Best Buy, I was fortunate enough to get in touch with the recruiter managing this opening (I think it was through the ACC Jobline, actually) and was so excited when we agreed that I was a great fit. The interview process really solidified how much I wanted to work here with this amazing group of people helping to create a wonderful experience for our employees and customers.
What is the single greatest challenge that your law department is facing today, and how are you dealing with it?
I can’t speak for the whole department — we’re quite large, reporting through three different officers to our general counsel — but my single greatest challenge is being able to understand what we’re working on and how I can help (and then finding people and hours in the day to do the work!).
In October 2014, you were elected as chair of the ITPEC Committee? Tell me how you got involved initially?
I initially got involved in ITPEC shortly after I joined ACC. I was just a regular committee member at first. Later, Kim Overs, who was the chair-elect, put out a call for a committee secretary. Since I was on the calls every month anyway, I felt like it wouldn’t be that big a stretch to take minutes (I used to keep the phone on mute so my keyboard noises wouldn’t transmit). When Kim transitioned off, our vice chair determined that she wouldn’t be able to continue in leadership, and Kim asked if I wanted to be the chair. I didn’t. I felt at the time that I didn’t have enough contacts within the organization to be a good leader. To this day I feel like that was the right decision. We got a wonderful, driven chair in the form of Allison Malin, and she and I were excellent partners in our Committee efforts. I learned a lot from her that I’m applying now in my role as chair, and waiting those two additional years has really made me a better leader than I would have been otherwise.
What are some of the ways that the ITPEC Committee provides value to its members?
We are so lucky to be representing in-house counsel in a really fastmoving area of law. We have great leadership who work in these areas on a day-to-day basis and are able to identify issues and bring them to the group. We also have a very active Committee membership and eGroup to keep things moving. We also have top-notch topical area subcommittees that are keeping their fingers on the pulse of what’s new and interesting about IT, privacy and ecommerce. I love the quick hits we’re able to provide, and our Annual Meeting sessions are always full of useful information. We’re also working on publishing as much as we can to bring that information to the broader ACC membership base. Although, in this area, we’re negatively impacted by how fast things change, because we’re always concerned that by the time we get something published, it might be out of date.
What substantive practice issues does your committee address?
We address anything related to information technology, privacy, and ecommerce. We have substantive subcommittees relating to Cloud, Social Media, Big Data and one which provides “early warning” of legislative issues which may interest members. Our sponsor, Fieldfisher, is well known in Europe for exactly these issues, and we are fortunate that we have a lot of heavy hitters in the industry participating. It’s quite an exciting time for us, so we’re always checking to make sure that our offerings match what our members want, and adjusting our offerings or providing additional resources to be able to meet their needs.
How has the ITPEC Committee helped you in your career?
My work in the Committee has helped me issue-spot for my clients in a way that I probably wouldn’t be able to with narrower experience. It’s also given me contacts in in-house legal practice that I wouldn’t have had otherwise.
