RUBY ANANDAJAYASEKERAM - SHELL AUSTRALIA

I consider myself a global citizen; I have Sri Lankan heritage, I was born in Canada, I spent my childhood in Africa, migrated to Australia when I was 13 and I’m lucky to call Australia home. I am married to Ned, an architect, and we have a wonderful daughter, Annika, who is now ten. We all work together to support and enable a dual career family. I love great coffee, food and wine, travel, walking, yoga, time with my family and have found a new hobby during the recent lockdowns in Melbourne, gardening.

I am currently Senior Legal Counsel, Global Litigation (Asia Pacific) at Shell, responsible for managing disputes in Australia and NZ, as well as more complex matters in Asia Pacific. This role provides me with the opportunity to work with people from all around the world and learn about doing business in different cultures. The majority of my career has been at Shell in various legal roles, spanning international arbitrations, to cross-border M&A, as well as operational legal roles. Prior to Shell, I was at Allens Linklaters for five years, where I learned from some of the best lawyers in Australia.

profession). I missed out on entry to study medicine by one mark and I was devastated. My focus on becoming a doctor meant that I hadn’t given much thought to what I would do as an alternative. I was 17 and it was probably the first time I felt real failure, disappointment, and more importantly that I had let my parents down. But I have always been resilient and believed in the power of hard work – I picked myself up and started to explore other opportunities. My mum was keen for me to study law, but I refused to do law ‘just because I got the marks’. I started off studying an economics and commerce degree at the Australian National University to complement my strengths at school. I was one of very few girls in my high school who excelled in math and physics (despite my physics teacher telling me in Year 11 that I would be better off doing home economics as it might be better suited to me…boy was he wrong, and I was determined to prove him otherwise!). I was surrounded by law students at my residential college, and ended up transferring to a commerce and law degree after my first year at university, though I promised myself I would never become a lawyer (my closest connections with anyone in the law at that point were the characters from the TV shows Ally McBeal and The Practice). After a summer clerkship at Arthur Robinson & Hedderwicks (now Allens Linklaters), I developed an appreciation for legal practice which I had not expected – I really enjoyed it and have not looked back.

After finishing my degree, I started my career at Allens, and like most young lawyers around me, I thought I would stay in private practice and become a partner. Two things changed my course. First, a secondment to Shell early in my third year (it was fun practising at the coal-face and I enjoyed exercising a commercial mindset). Second, a realisation shortly after I got married that despite the great people and quality work, I wanted better integration between my work and my life outside of work and I wasn’t sure I could achieve it in private practice. Fortunately, the planets aligned, and I moved into an-house role at Shell in my fifth year. I was drawn to the in-house way of practising, as well as the people, culture, global business, and interesting and challenging work.

While I never had a fixed plan for how my career would start or pan out (and still don’t), I have always had high expectations of myself, value for hard work, authenticity, integrity and have had strong drive and ambition. People are my strength and I have a lot of energy for my career – I have followed the path that allowed me to enjoy what I do and that has served me well.

I was fortunate to have been mentored by some inspirational male partners who believed in me and have continued to take an interest in and support me through my career. There were few female role models (particularly in M&A) when I started my career, and those that made it to the top had so many war stories to share. More recently, I have had young female lawyers of colour come up to me and say how great it is to see a senior lawyer from an ethnic background. They have shared with me how that helps them see a path in the profession. It has caused me to stop and reflect on the importance of role-models and how when ‘you can’t be what you can’t see’, there may be an invisible hurdle that can make it harder to reach your true potential.

My mentors and sponsors have backed me, given me confidence, actively advocated for and helped me become “ more ‘visible’. They have opened their networks to create opportunities for me that I wouldn’t have had otherwise. We all need a bit of encouragement and support to take the next step.” celebrate your differences, be proud of it, and don’t leave it at the door when you walk into your workplace… “ always believe in yourself and never give up.”

Many people have influenced my career including my mentors and sponsors and my husband, Ned. My mentors and sponsors have backed me, given me confidence, actively advocated for and helped me become more ‘visible’. They have opened their networks to create opportunities for me that I wouldn’t have had otherwise. We all need a bit of encouragement and support to take the next step. From my own experience, I have learnt the importance of mentoring and actively advocating for those around us (particularly to those who are different from us and those from underrepresented groups) – it truly makes a difference and will make the world a better place.

They also helped me appreciate the importance of bringing out the best in people, and how we each need to support each other in this regard. A couple of years ago, a colleague and I designed and rolled-out a reverse mentoring program globally that focused on Shell’s legal leaders reflecting on their leadership style and how they could become more inclusive leaders. We had over 100 people participate, and the feedback was humbling.

My husband Ned has always been supportive of me pursuing my career and flexible about how we managed things at home. I have worked part-time time; we both have worked part-time, now Ned works part-time. I wouldn’t be in my current role (which has a bit of travel, and many early morning and late night calls), without Ned (and Annika’s) support.

Working in-house gives me the opportunity to have a seat at the table, partner with colleagues in the business to find solutions and tackle challenging issues. I get a buzz out of combining the legal perspective with advice on strategy and commercial issues and driving our business forward sustainably in accordance with our values and with the long game in mind.

The in-house legal profession has changed considerably since I joined it 16 years ago. Back then, there was a bit of a stigma around in-house lawyers often being seen as the lawyers who didn’t quite cut it in private practice. The tide has changed, and a career inhouse is now highly sought after. Whilst in-house law is growing exponentially, I think we can do a lot more to leverage our influence on the legal profession more generally - I’d like to see each of us do more to change the culture to achieve a more accessible, inclusive, collaborative and caring profession. Pay it forward.

If I could give my younger self one piece of advice it would be “celebrate your differences, be proud of it, and don’t leave it at the door when you walk into your workplace…always believe in yourself and never give up.” It has been a journey for me, and I have become increasingly involved in advocating for diversity, equity and inclusion in the workplace. For me, it took getting to a certain level of seniority to feel more comfortable advocating for these values in the workplace. Some of these conversations are harder (and more uncomfortable) than others. I have few peers who are women (or men) of colour which makes the topic of ethnic and racial diversity in the workplace a more challenging topic to confront than gender and one that I have shied away from until recently. I have realised, though, that if we don’t have the courage to have these difficult conversations, listen, and take action, things won’t change. While we have come a long way, we still have a long way to go. I am inspired by young lawyers who have the courage to speak up about what they believe in and am committed to doing what I can to support them and to contribute to meaningful and lasting change in this space.