Anirma Gupta has a phrase she uses to describe good leadership: creating the conditions where her entire team can make good decisions consistently. She has spent more than three decades honing that skill as CLO at Unity, the gaming software platform that powers millions of the world's most popular games, and before that across cybersecurity, AI, data privacy, SaaS, and advanced technology companies.
Board members describe Anirma as calm and grounded. She describes herself as someone who puts her game face on regardless of what's going on inside, because that's a CLO’s job. In this conversation, Anirma shares with GC AI founder Cecilia Ziniti how she empowers her team to run major regulatory projects without her, how she builds board trust through consistency, and how she believes AI is changing the game for in-house lawyers.
"Leadership today is about judgment, not just speed,” Anirma said. “It's about values and not just outcomes. And it's about building organizations that can move quickly without losing trust."
How to Create the Conditions for Making Good Decisions
When the SEC's cybersecurity reporting rules came out, Anirma didn't just take the project herself like the company might have expected. Instead, she identified someone two levels below her that was smart, eager, and ready to step up, and handed the project to them. Then she did what any great leader does: she helped them understand the end goal, mapped the project stakeholders, stayed available to bounce ideas off of, and cleared obstacles when the path got complicated.
"When you have people who are enabled to do their best work, they often step up and actually do a great job. And then the business notices it," Anirma said.
The leadership framework she relies on to develop her team is the same, whether it’s a GDPR implementation or a new SEC reporting requirement. She starts by understanding what the law requires, then she selects the right person. This is not necessarily the most senior person, but the one who is the most ready for the moment. Then, together they map the stakeholders who should be involved and decide how they’ll get the project to the finish line.
"It's figuring out what the end game is,” she said. “Making sure they have the support they need, and being there as a sounding board through checkpoints. Are they hitting roadblocks? Do they need further support? Are they getting pushback from someone on the executive team? Those are all elements of enabling."
Note from CZ: The way Anirma describes empowering younger attorneys is the kind of career-defining moment that compounds. I've been on both sides of those moments. The CLO who creates that moment builds a team that outlasts any single project or leadership transition.
Building Trust With Boards via Consistency and Judgment
Throughout Anirma’s career she’s had the opportunity to work with multiple boards through CEO transitions, regulatory shifts, and high-pressure moments. Her approach to building trust with board members is simple: show up prepared and ready to account for the issues that are genuinely yours to own. Do this consistently enough, and the board will begin to truly value your judgment because they know you have been thorough.
One piece of advice she offers to in-house legal is to draw a clear line between the CLO’s role and the CEO’s. Strategy questions belong to the CEO and the business leaders. Governance, legal, and compliance questions belong to the CLO. Anirma is deliberate maintaining that boundary because clarity around ownership builds relationships long-term.
"Being laser focused on what the issue is and what you're trying to solve for, and doing that consistently time and time again, is how you build trust over time," she said.
Part of this is knowing when to engage. Board members are busy. Many are operators themselves, sitting on multiple boards, and running their own organizations. Reaching out every time something crosses your desk is not the move. Instead, reach out when something genuinely needs board approval, and be sure you’ve done your homework ahead of time.
"It's important to exercise judgment about when to engage with the board," Anirma said. “And when you do, be ready to articulate very crisply what the issue is, why the board member needs to know about it, and have a couple of solutions ready so the discussion can be focused on problem solving."
In addition to engaging at the right moments, Anirma always comes into a high-pressure room with a calm and composed attitude, which helps everyone to think clearly and rationally.
"I think consistency and calm are superpowers,” she said. “Multiple board members have talked to me about being calm and grounded. I think that is part of the role and part of how we need to show up as GCs and CLOs."
Helping Your Team Manage “Lawyer Anxiety”
There is something endemic to the legal personality that most lawyers don't like to acknowledge: the constant anxiety. The weight of knowing what can go wrong in any given situation, combined with the professional responsibility to name risk leads to catastrophizing. Anirma names this anxiety directly, and focuses on building a team environment where everyone feels safe to share how they feel.
"I like to be a safe space,” Anirma said. “I tell them, it's okay to be nervous. Tell me what you're worried about. Let's talk through what potential solutions might be to the issue that's causing you worry. If you address it upfront, it's less likely to show up when it counts."
Anirma notes that managing team anxiety is less about reassurance than preparation. When someone on her team is anxious about a presentation or a difficult conversation, her approach is to surface the specific worry, and then work through each possible scenario together until the anxiety has somewhere constructive to go.
Along with this, Anirma is conscious about not becoming the face of the legal team at the expense of her team’s growth. Instead, she works alongside the team member assigned to an important project, helps them think through hard questions and how they’ll present their solution. Anirma’s approach to team development is rather simple: let them handle it, with you beside them at first, and eventually without you at all.
"Part of my philosophy is to create opportunities where my leaders can interact with management and the board because that's how they're going to learn,” she said. “I need to be there initially by their side, helping them think through the issues, and then let them handle the situation, and over time, handle situations on their own."
Note from CZ: One of my mentors kept tissues in their office. At the time I thought it was just practical, but later on I understood it was a signal that their office is a place where it is okay to be human. The best lawyers own their anxiety before it owns them.
What AI Changes About the CLO Role (and What It Doesn’t)
Anirma's prediction for the profession is that legal departments and law firms will be smaller, and there will be fewer opportunities for people unwilling to develop genuine judgment. AI will handle the digesting, the drafting, and the routine work. What will set in-house lawyers apart is the good judgment AI cannot replace.
"I've had situations where somebody wanted to make a decision because of the emotion; they were angry or frustrated,” Anima said. “Part of my job is to say: I hear you. If you want to litigate, here's what it's going to look like. Here's what it's going to take. Is that what you are ready to sign up for?"
She recommends investing in an intelligent legal AI tool that can surface the facts, analyze the communications, and assess your company’s legal exposure. What AI can’t do, however, is weigh the cost of deposing three executives against the precedent set by settling with a repeat plaintiff, factor in the emotional state of the CEO who wants to fight, or make the call about whether this is worth it given where the business is right now. Those calls still belong to the General Counsel or CLO.
"AI is going to put even more emphasis on the judgment aspect of being a lawyer,” she said. “AI can help you gather facts and synthesize them. But the real value-add is at the judgment layer: taking that information, understanding the business context, and helping the company make tough decisions."
Anirma warns that good judgment doesn't accrue automatically. It has to be built deliberately, through an apprenticeship model, by leaders who coach people through situations rather than solve the problems themselves. The CLOs who understand that (and build teams accordingly) are the ones who will thrive in the next decades.
GC AI is built for legal teams that want to move faster at the research and drafting layer so they can spend more time on the calls that require a lawyer. Try it free at gc.ai.
