FTG 0060 – From Shenango to the C-Suite with Chief Legal Officer Bob Perna ’85

My pleasure, thanks for having me.

Sure. I grew up in Sharon, Pennsylvania. We had a branch campus, Shenango Valley campus, in our town. My older brother went to Penn State, and it didn't take but one or two campus visits and maybe a football game to convince me that that's where I wanted to go. It was such a vibrant campus, so much going on, a beautiful setting. But I think also the fact that we did have the branch campus in our hometown let me kind of continue working part-time, live at home, kind of save some money. So it was just the combination of the two: a great world-class institution and a local branch campus where I could spend a couple years before going to University Park that really attracted me to Penn State.

Sure. Well, I thought it was a great way to kind of ease into a Big Ten college setting. Being able to spend a couple years locally in a smaller setting, when it did come time to move to University Park, I had a group of friends. We knew people. My roommates were from Shenango campus, so we knew people already, and that really helped with the transition. We knew folks that had transferred up the year before and had visited them on occasion. So it really allowed us to ease into, I'd say, more the social scene. I think the academic rigor was the same at the branch campus, so that prepared you well for that. But the social scene, how you get around, where's this building, where's that building, I was able to make a few visits beforehand through different events and classes and visits, so I felt comfortable with the campus. And then knowing people there kind of made life a little easier to move into a Big Ten school.

Yeah, it really is. And I guess I didn't answer your first question about the University Scholar program, but that was a big part of that transition as well. At the time it was University Scholars Program, so forgive me if I keep referring to it as that. This was in the early years; it had only been up and running for a few years, and I was invited to join my junior year when I was moving to campus. So right off the bat, that gave me a group outside of the normal classroom of folks to get to know, and that helped in the transition as well. I also got involved in student government, the USG at the time, Undergraduate Student Government, and represented the off-campus group. We were living in an apartment at the time. I just tried to get involved with a lot of the extracurriculars, the groups and the activities that were available. That's the great thing about a school like Penn State: there's just so much to offer, so it was easy to get involved in some of those things.

Yeah, it might have been a little process of elimination, frankly. I did not want to get into the science and engineering, math aspect of things. I wasn't sort of liberal arts kind of bent, but I kind of had an interest in business. This was the 80s, and the stock market was really booming, a lot of finance-related topics in the news, the S&L crisis, inflation and so forth. So it was an area that interested me. One of my early classes was an accounting class, and I had a professor at Shenango campus that really turned me on to finance and business and accounting. From there, I think it was my first year that really said, hey, I enjoyed this. Looking at the curriculum, I kind of narrowed in on that area, finance.

Exactly, yeah. It was a sexy time for finance, a lot going on.

Yeah, so my thesis was entitled 'Money Market Mutual Funds: Their Reaction to the Money Market Deposit Account.' Not as sexy as it sounds, or maybe it is. But it was a different era. What came about in the time of rising interest rates: we were at a period in the early 80s where banks were capped in terms of what they could offer in interest on savings and checking accounts. This was in the day where they couldn't give you interest, but they could give you a free toaster if you opened an account, gifts and things like that. Rates were going up, and people were looking for places to put their money. Money market mutual funds, which are still around today, were a popular option. They gave people an opportunity to get some yield, fairly safe investments. Banks were losing a lot of deposits because they couldn't compete with their interest rates. So in the early 80s, Congress through deregulation opened up the banks to offer more interest and created these money market deposit accounts. That phenomenon is what I looked at in my thesis: how did the market mutual funds react to this new competition from the banks? What I found was their portfolio became a little more risky; they tried to offer more yield, which means more risk. For the money market mutual funds, although very safe investments, their duration expanded, trying to get more yield. The government bonds they invested in tended to be a little more risky, not much, but their risk was expanding because they were competing with these money market deposit accounts. So that was the basis for my thesis. I really enjoyed the process, very rigorous, and I think that's a good crossover into law school and my career in law. It emphasized the rigor you need when you do a thesis. It was my first real in-depth research project at that level: the precision, how you use your words, how you support your sentences and observations, and being able to defend those. It was very enlightening to go through that depth, a year and a half process, the organization, getting the resources, meeting with my adviser. I think that helped me in law school and how I approached my studies there as well.

Well, another common theme: I had a business law class at Penn State, I think was my junior year, and really saw the intersection between law and business. They are so related. I was interested in the law but really wanted to pursue business. With that class, I came to the realization that I can go into law as a transactional, corporate lawyer and still stay very much involved in business. A lot of CEOs are lawyers. It doesn't close a door by going to law school if you want to stay involved and engaged in business. I knew there was a path to do that, so I pivoted to law school and pursued a track of corporate transactional securities work, where I can work with companies and businesses, help them achieve their goals and solve their problems. That's what really energized me and my work in law school.

I think the Scholars Program in particular, the rigor of the thesis, the opportunity it gave me, I would encourage all current Scholars to take advantage of the broad curriculum. It let me go outside of my College of Business program. I took a great political science course that really opened my eyes to the world of politics and the history of politics. I find it so important to understand those other disciplines. But you got to do the work. That's always true, particularly in law school. I think the habits you develop at Penn State and in the Scholars Program are going to pay off. You develop good habits, you have to do the work, think critically, think globally. Don't just put your blinders on and say, 'I'm this major, that's all I'm going to focus on.' Be open to other subject matters, other disciplines, take some other courses, because that perspective, particularly in business and in law, is very helpful. So that would be my advice.

Much different campus, an urban campus for sure at George Washington University. I think at the graduate level, particularly in law school at least what I can speak to, it's less of a social scene. The dynamic, particularly in your first year, you are in the library a lot, you're studying a lot. Those distractions just aren't there on the social side. You tend to focus on your studies more. I worked after my first year in law school and worked during my second year, so you start to have a more professional life other than just going to school. DC offered a lot of opportunities for that, obviously a lot of law firms, the government, and so forth. It did provide a lot of opportunities, but college life was over. It's more just your studies and your work, so it's a little different vibe than the undergraduate experience. But University Park is a big campus, you kind of got to use your street smarts. DC was no different. It was an easy transition. We had a Metro there in DC, didn't have that in University Park, but otherwise you stuck to your studies, did your work, and it was an easy transition for me.

Try not to be distracted. You kind of know what you're there for. You got to do outlines, you got to plan out what you're going to do. You're not being spoon-fed. You have a final at the end of the year, and that's kind of what your grade is based on. So it is something you have to plan for, and you have to digest a lot of information over that semester. If you're not staying on top of things, staying ahead of things, you may read 100 pages a night and have to digest some cases. If you fall behind even for a few days, it's tough to dig out of that hole. So stay disciplined, do the work, and plan ahead. Everyone, I remember when I was there, it was very helpful to do an outline, something you can review at the end. It's also a good way to learn the information, just reiterating it, organizing your thoughts, and creating an outline. I think that was vital. You're going to be surrounded by a lot of other smart people, folks that are at an elite graduate school. So collaborate and talk with them, listen to them, do study groups. There are all different perspectives out there. We tend to be a little insular, but as you move on, collaboration is so important. So get with a study group. Particularly in law school, the debates you have on things, things aren't always black and white, there's a lot of gray. Just talking through things with people is very helpful.

GW, like Penn State, had a good career development group that put students on to a lot of opportunities. So really leverage that starting in my first year. What I tried to do was try a variety of different settings. I did a summer internship at a smaller law firm in DC after my first year, and then my second year worked at a larger firm in DC, which ultimately led to my first job out of GW. I tried small practice, learned a lot there, went to a larger firm to experience that setting, and I liked that setting. So leverage the resources you have at the school. This was before the job search boards and everything on the internet today, but it was a lot of postings and interviews on campus and things like that. And you'd be surprised, of course, the alumni open doors. Just like PSU, alumni are at different companies or law firms. One regret I have is I didn't really try a government position. Being in DC, that would have been a natural and good opportunity, but I never did any government service. I would encourage folks that that's your opportunity to try different things, so take advantage of it.

Yeah, so I practiced at a law firm for about six or seven years, where you work for a variety of companies, small businesses, large businesses, whatever comes in the door. I was doing general corporate and real estate transactional work. But I got to the point in my law practice where I wanted the opportunity to really get involved in a business, get to know a business, and focus on it. So through headhunters that call on occasion, I took an opportunity here in Chicago. That's what caused me to move out to the Midwest for an in-house role, a corporate counsel role, doing a lot of what I did in private practice but just for one company. Being able to focus on it, be vested in the success or failures of that company, that's where my business bent never went away. I really wanted to get back into corporate life. From that point on, I think that was in '95, I've been in-house ever since. I just like the dynamics of the in-house practice, working with business professionals and legal professionals. I've been fortunate to work at some large companies with very sophisticated law departments and smaller groups, and I continue to learn a lot from all the great business folks I work with all the time.

Yeah, law is never boring. Business changes all the time, competitive pressures, geopolitical pressures. It's a very fast-moving environment, and frankly, that's what I like about it. It's never boring, it's never the same thing. As I moved up the ladder in my career and taken more broad responsibility for a legal department or import/export compliance or ESG, environmental social governance, which is really becoming a hot topic, I come to rely on a lot of subject matter experts. I've been fortunate to work with a lot of great professionals who know patents, know IP, know import/export regulations to a very great degree. When we need to, we pick up the phone and call the law firms who have very deep expertise in particular areas, particularly litigation, some antitrust litigation or something, you really need some specialists to help you. Knowing who to call and working with them is a big part of my job, helping the company manage those outside firms. Obviously we try to do as much as we can in-house with our teams. I think a big part of an in-house lawyer's role is issue spotting. You may not have all the answers, may not know the regulation, but know enough to say, 'Wait a minute, this could be a problem, we need to look at that.' Then you bring in the subject matter experts as you need them. But 80% of the stuff you tend to triage and make a call on based on the risk, or you go research it. Really, it's issue spotting, knowing when to ask the right questions, when to pursue something with an outside firm or maybe do a little more work on it. Obviously staying up to date on what's happening in a global economy with global companies, you have to cover a lot of jurisdictions, so that's a big part of my day as well, staying on top of some of the changes going on in the legal world and geopolitical environment.

Right. And I think being able to apply that in a business setting where nothing is risk-free, and while I represent the company, the company is my client, there are business goals we're trying to achieve. We always have to balance the risk with the benefits of how we achieve a business goal. We try not to tell our business clients 'no, you can't do that,' but rather say, 'Well, can we do it this way and maybe mitigate some of our risk?' The earlier we can get involved in those conversations, the more value we can add as an internal team because we do understand the business so well, we live it every day. Being able to engage with them early and help them shape a transaction, or instead of going down one path, choose a different path that can reduce risk or provide an easier, maybe more economical way to do something, is really fruitful for me.

Yeah, that's a very good question. This whole notion of business ethics was really starting to develop in the 80s as a real discipline. I've been fortunate that the executive teams and the business folks I work with have always been very high integrity. You never have to have the conversation where you say, 'I'll have to quit if we do that.' I've always worked with folks of high integrity and would find it difficult to be in a different situation. Nevertheless, you still have to make that balance. As an in-house lawyer, we can always go to our board of directors. The corporation is our client, but we deal every day with the executives. I think educating our constituents on the risks and potential pitfalls of a certain path has always been the way to approach those thorny issues. To say, 'Well, I understand what you're trying to do, but there's some significant risk here, something we may need to discuss with the board to make sure they appreciate it, or discuss with our CEO,' kind of escalating it up the ladder to make sure we're being very transparent about what we're doing and the right decision maker at the right level has made that call. I've never been in a situation where we've crossed the line, but typically you get up to the right decision maker, and we all appreciate that our reputation and good name is not worth a particular sale or transaction. It's just too risky, and our reputation is worth too much to try to cut a corner. So sometimes things come up, but I always find you escalate it, explain the risk, and rational heads always tend to prevail when you're working with good people.

Yeah, thank you.

I think it's so important for anyone on a team in business. We've talked about collaboration skills. That's something you can start to hone whether you're a member of an athletic team, an academic team, a study group. Just being able to work with people and collaborate is so important in business and law, and I think in life. Those collaboration skills to translate what you know, you may be an expert in a technical field, you may have a PhD, but you have to be able to communicate that to maybe an accountant or a lawyer who doesn't have that technical background. You need to be able to communicate well and break down complex issues so they can be understood. Working with your team, I think that's so important. Solution orientation, again particularly in a business setting, you can't just say 'here's the problem, here's the problem, here's the problem.' How can you help solve the problem? You have to have that kind of mindset. A lot of folks coming into the corporate world sometimes don't have the emotional intelligence that's needed in a company. That's really how you read people. There's probably not a class, maybe there is now these days, on emotional intelligence in business school or Smeal, but that's just so important: how you read a room, what drives people, having empathy. We deal with people, you have to motivate people, you have to read people. If you're in a negotiation, you deal with a lot of different disciplines, and people come from a lot of different backgrounds. That's so important for me when I look at people coming into the organization: do they have that emotional intelligence, which to me is so much more important than IQ necessarily. If you don't have those skills. And lastly, I know the world has changed a lot since I was at Penn State in the Scholars Program, but thinking globally is so important in the world we live in. You have to be able to understand cultures and ways business is done, just how the world works and business for that matter. I remember one of my early professors when I was a sophomore said, 'Go get a subscription to the Wall Street Journal.' Now we have all kinds of alternatives online, but start to learn how business works and finance works, and frankly how the world transacts. We hear a lot about the Fed, and what does that mean? It's good to have an appreciation for a lot of that stuff, particularly as you go into the business world.

Right, it all comes around. Always comes back. Fairly cyclical.

Yeah, well, it takes a lot of explaining who we are and what we do. I always have to have my elevator speech ready when I tell them I work at Knowles and what we do. Fortunately, well before my time, the company has developed a reputation in our field of being a leader. We started in the 1940s with hearing aids and putting receivers. Any kind of small microphone or receiver is where we get involved. I'm sure we're both talking on microphones more than likely from Knowles. We are in smartphones, smart speakers, wireless earbuds, all of that. It's some wonderful technology, and it's an area where we are known as a leader. In our field, as a business-to-business company as opposed to business-to-consumer, we're very well known. So in the technical industry, it's easy to say we're from Knowles and doors open. For the engineers looking for a job in acoustics or electrical engineering, I think our reputation precedes us in those areas in terms of our fellows and research. So I feel very good about that. But we are not a brand name. We work with all the big global brands in this industry, and it does take a little explaining each time to tell them a little bit about what we do and that they probably have a couple dozen of our microphones throughout their house and don't know it.

We are happy to say we do recruit at Penn State. We have a number of Penn State alumni at Knowles in a lot of different fields. We also sponsor some scholarships in the College of Engineering there as well. So I would say campus recruiting for sure. Look for us, we're on the job boards, we tend to post things on LinkedIn as well. Take advantage of that. And don't underestimate alumni connections. Through LinkedIn and all the social stuff now, it's easy to identify folks at companies. I would encourage folks in the program or undergrads, graduate students, to reach out to alumni at Knowles. We are happy to help. We do have an internship program that's a great opportunity for people to experience Knowles. We had a couple Penn State grads in the past, I think they were in their graduate programs, been through our internship program in the summer. So we have a pretty robust program there. I would encourage folks to get in touch through on-campus programs.

Absolutely. And of course, I'd offer, I'm on LinkedIn. Knowles has a pretty robust website that tells you a lot about what we do and the type of things we do. I would encourage anyone to take a look at that, and if I can help with any information, feel free to connect with me on LinkedIn. I'd be happy to talk to folks.

Yeah, we are in consumer electronics, but we're also very big into medtech, aerospace, and defense. We work with a lot of Fortune 100 companies, the big behemoths in all of those industries. In my career when I was in the automotive area, you deal with all the big automakers. One thing I found in common in all those situations is that these companies really push their suppliers to do more, do better. They are always looking for an edge in the marketplace, so they really push you for better technology: how can we make this widget have more features, cheaper, something that is a big advantage to them. They really challenge you to come up with better products. They force you to have better processes because they are looking for cost savings and efficiency. That makes your operations organization so vital to make sure you have a lean operation. Your quality has to be world class. Your maybe 10-cent component that's going into one of their products can really harm their reputation if it doesn't work, and they have to get their product returned. In some of our applications, they're going in pacemakers, they're going in life-critical devices. When you're dealing with some of the big companies, their quality, their name is on the line. They may not know Knowles in the consumer world, but they know some of these big brands. If something doesn't work, it's the brand that takes the hit. So they push us to be world class in quality, process, the best technology. It makes us a better company. We complain sometimes that they're being tough on us, but it really pushes us to be a world-class supplier. That opens doors to other customers. When we can tell them that we're supplying X, Y, and Z for big companies like that, for a smaller company or someone trying to get into the field, it really opens some doors for us because we do have the quality certifications, the lean processes, the quality controls. So it's a plus when you get involved at that level.

I would say be flexible, be open to opportunities. If I think back to when I was maybe junior, senior at Penn State and thinking about where my career path would take me both personally and professionally, what my life would be, I would have never guessed where I am and what I'm doing. So you have to be open to opportunities. I was on the East Coast and moved out to the Midwest. Be open to that. You won't be there forever. If you try something, there are other opportunities around. You gain experience with every move. For me, Sharon was a smaller community, didn't have as many opportunities, so one of the reasons my first jobs were away from the area. I'll make my plug for Chicago. I think the Midwest is a great place to practice and live, it's a very livable city. But I would just say be open to opportunities. Don't foreclose, particularly if you're younger, newer in your career. You're really going to get some different experiences, and that does help you professionally. You build your resume and take some different opportunities.

Be humble. And maybe I'm being a little cliché, but I think that means listening instead of talking a lot. Learn, be open, be curious, think broadly and critically about things, but be humble. There's a lot you can learn from people, from experiences, from different classes. Take that in. Approach the world and your career that way, and you will learn a lot and contribute in that way.

Well, we've covered a lot of ground here. I think the one I get the most, and you may have asked it in so many words, is 'I get what do you do exactly?' They've heard 'general counsel' and okay, I'm a lawyer, but what do you do in a company? How does that work? Do you go to court? Typically, do not go to court. You have to be licensed in the jurisdiction where you actually have to litigate a matter. So unless the matter is here in Illinois in my district, I'm not going to go to court, I don't have that experience, so we hire people. But it's kind of like, what do you do exactly? I'm glad you gave me a little bit of opportunity to talk about the role of a general counsel. I like to think we wear a lot of different hats: compliance, business person, legal advisor, and all that. I always end up explaining that to our people, to folks that ask me. In our internship programs, we have an opportunity to meet with our interns, and I always kind of walk through what we do and the different hats we wear and why legal and compliance is a big part of business.

Well, obviously personally, it's being married to my beautiful wife of 35 years now, also a Penn State alum, I'll add. I met her on campus. And raising our three wonderful children. Doesn't get much better than that. Professionally, I don't know if there's any one thing I'd point to, but being able to lead a high-functioning group of legal professionals, getting the respect of your colleagues, I can't think of any greater compliment than that. So having achieved that, being viewed as a trusted business partner by my business colleagues, again from an in-house lawyer, I can't think of a greater compliment than when one of your business colleagues comes and asks you a question that's not purely legal but just kind of wants to throw something by and get your advice, and you're able to provide some help on a business level. So being a trusted adviser, particularly in the GC role at a public company, it's global, a lot of issues, work with a lot of smart people, and gaining their trust is a big success for me.

I don't know about one moment, but I'd go back to this emotional intelligence. Coming out of law school, I was kind of like, 'Hey, I know everything, let me tell you,' diving in to confront people in negotiations or in a deal or some litigation that I was involved in, and then finding out that can backfire. I'm not sure I'm serving my client's interest by raising my voice and trying to pursue something. One of the reasons I like transactional work, particularly M&A type work, is both sides want to get to a deal, and you have to tease out what's important for both sides. Sometimes it's not mutually exclusive, there can be a win-win situation. But how you get there, how you tease that out in the context of a sometimes very tough negotiation, for me the biggest learning moment was just understanding people, what motivates them. Sometimes you got to step back a bit, put a couple cards on the table, or listen to what's important to them. It's not always 'I win, you lose.' Going with that mindset has helped me in my career, and it's been a big learning moment.

That's a tough question because it kind of depends on the mentor and the mentee. I've always found the best match there just comes kind of naturally. I've been in programs where it's very structured and you're assigned mentors and mentees, but the best experience I've had, both as a mentee and a mentor, has developed naturally. Working with someone, you just sort of relate, and you feel you can help the person or you can gain something from the experience. It's not a forced, structured arrangement. So look for opportunities. You may talk with someone outside your discipline or meet someone, and if you have that rapport, ask them, 'Hey, would you mind if we get together for coffee or lunch? I'd like to talk to you about your career path.' I find in most cases, people love to talk about what they do and will be very open to that. So it doesn't have to be a real formal relationship with things on the calendar five months out. It may be more natural and not too forced. But I think it is good to have someone outside of your chain of command or your discipline to give you a different perspective. Someone within your company though is important because there are those unwritten norms or the political side of things that you're not going to find in the employee handbook or some written process. That's the type of thing you want a mentor to help you understand how that works in your company and organization. And then in terms of professional development, it's always good to find someone who has done the things you'd like to be able to do and pick their brain about how they got here, what was important. That stuff is just invaluable.

Yeah, don't be late for a meeting, this guy does this, this person likes that. Every company has those, every organization has those.

Oh, for sure. My adviser for my thesis and my finance mentor was Professor Randy Woolridge. He was just a young professor at the time, and I know he's still very involved in the Smeal College. What he helped me with in my thesis, someone who had never done that before, the professionalism and the academic challenges he posed in finance really impressed me and kept me engaged in the corporate world. So big shout out to him. The other professor I'd mention is Frank Evans. He was my accounting professor at Shenango Valley campus when I was there. He was the one that gave me advice to read the Wall Street Journal, but also helped me with an internship when I was there and got me engaged in the business side of things. He was a great practitioner and professor. I think he was a part-time professor, an adjunct there at the time, but really cared about students and helped me a lot.

No, I mean, I would just reiterate for folks: develop good habits, take advantage of the opportunities the Scholars Program offered. I feel that I did at the time, and it really broadened my horizons about what's out there in the world and opportunities I could pursue. Think broadly and critically. Any discipline, law, business, wherever you end up, have some critical analytical skills, do the work, and develop good habits. This is the time to do that.

I didn't have to look at the menu, I know the flavors, believe me. One of my favorites, I would be Peachy Paterno. A couple reasons. First, it reminds me of summer, peaches, one of my favorite seasons, so that was natural. I think it's nothing fancy, kind of a classic flavor. I think it's been around since I've been there, at least the 80s I remember. So just a classic flavor, gets the job done, nothing fancy, but it's good ice cream. And lastly, if there had to be a nationality for ice cream, I assume it's Italian American. I'm Italian American, so I can relate to Peachy Paterno. So that would be the other reason I'd pick it.

Yeah, perfect. I don't know if it's one of their favorite flavors, probably vanilla is, but it's been around a long time and it's my favorite.

Yeah, my pleasure. Thank you. You made this very easy, and this is a great way to reach Scholars. I appreciate the opportunity to talk a little bit about what worked for me and hope it helps folks.