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MOVES
03 2010
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Industry pro in place to help nurse Health Net back to peak form.
tALEnt injECtiOn
HEALTH NET, INC., PROVIDER OF MANAGED
health care coverage to some 6. 7 million
members across the United States, is self-medicating. But it’s all perfectly legal.
The prescription: a new general counsel, AnGELEE BOuChARD. The Health Net
veteran was injected into the top slot in
December.
Bouchard joined the Woodland Hills,
California–based Health Net in 2003
from the Los Angeles office of Latham
& Watkins and was
almost immediately
promoted to assistant
general counsel and
assistant corporate
secretary. She was
charged with handling
the company’s corporate finance and M&A
Angelee Bouchard
work and, as assistant corporate secretary, attended board meetings. (“
Getting to know the board well probably
helped me land this job,” she says.)
According to Bouchard, Health Net
puts a premium on retaining top talent.
In fact, the lawyer she replaces, LinDA
tiAnO, is staying with the company. She’s
moving to Shelton, Connecticut, to run
Health Net subsidiary Regional Health
Plans, Health Net of the Northeast, Inc.
DAVID PLUNKERT/THEISPOT. COM (ILLUSTRATION)
The ailing company does have some
lost ground to make up. According to
its latest financials, Health Net posted a
$3.8 million loss through the third quarter of 2009. Health Net isn’t alone in its
revenue falloff; the industry as a whole
awaits the return to a robust economy.
As for challenges in her future,
Bouchard sees a big one on the horizon.
“The [pending congressional] health
care reform, none of us are quite sure
how that’s going to affect Health Net,”
she says. Companies like Health Net
are sure to have to swallow some bitter
pills, depending on what eventually gets
included in the reform bill that lands on
President Barack Obama’s desk.
* *
SUDS AHOY
Change is brewing in the legal department of one of the world’s largest beer
makers. Molson Coors Brewing Company has promoted ShERRi hECkEL
kuhLMAnn to chief compliance officer.
Meanwhile, Mike Abbass is now general
counsel of Molson Coors International.
Kuhlmann joined Molson Coors
in February 2009 as deputy general
counsel. She had been a partner at the
law firm of Holme Roberts & Owen
for ten years, where she specialized
in business and employment law and
handled cases for Molson Coors and
Coors Brewing Company, as well as a
variety of Colorado-based and national
organizations. She still serves as deputy
general counsel, focusing on litigation
management, supply chain, real estate,
and water rights issues, and employee
relations and benefits.
Abbass joined Molson Coors eight
years ago as an international tax analyst and has been a member of the
legal team for six years. He’s provided
legal counsel on a wide range of strategic business initiatives, including the
MillerCoors joint venture transaction
in 2008, as well as the company’s entry
into new markets in Asia, Latin America, and europe.
Kuhlmann and Abbass could not
immediately be reached for comment.
—ANDRe W HARD
*
ALL THE WORLD’S A STAGE
Jenner & Block and defense industry
contractor General
Dynamics Corporation have a long-standing counsel-client
relationship. It stems
back to the era of
Albert Jenner, Jr., who
became a name partner in 1955 and served
as an adviser to a General Dynamics director. So in 1984, when Jenner associate
Gregory Gallopoulos
