Antoine F. GoetschelJ.D., Dr. h.c.Attorney at Law
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External Legal Department

Continuous legal support as an independent point of contact — flexibly deployed for day-to-day business or strategically.

I am pleased to support you on legal questions, am at your disposal as an independent point of contact, and support you continuously in legally relevant questions as well as in good governance. In doing so, I can also draw on my further training in complementary consulting at Königswieser & Network GmbH in Vienna.

In detail

Legal support for ongoing matters

Legal questions rarely arise in isolation but rather in the flow of operations: a contract to be signed, a termination coming up, a complaint escalating, an enquiry from an authority, a project needing a sound contractual basis. As a continuous companion, I know the context and do not have to start over with every mandate. This shortens the paths, lowers the effort, and leads to answers that fit the reality of your organisation — not to abstract expert opinions.

Review of legal questions in day-to-day business

Daily work often centres on contracts and how to handle them: reviewing and negotiating drafts, keeping templates and general terms and conditions up to date, keeping an eye on deadlines and termination options, enforcing or defending claims. Added to this are questions from the HR area, from handling data and personality rights, from external communication, or from collaboration and partnerships. You receive a clear assessment with a concrete recommendation — and, where several paths are open, an honest weighing of opportunities, risks, and effort.

Strategic advice as external legal representation

Beyond day-to-day business, I am a conversation partner for the questions that set direction: building or restructuring an organisational structure, cooperations and mergers, new business areas, succession planning, dealing with a sensitive conflict or with public attention. As an external adviser, I bring something that is hard to have internally: distance. I am not part of the internal dynamic, have no role in existing loyalties, and can therefore also address what internally nobody likes to say out loud.

Flexibly deployable legal service

The scope is guided by your needs and can be adapted at any time: from ad-hoc availability for individual questions, through a fixed presence on agreed days or regular consultation hours, to supporting a time-limited project or bridging a vacancy in your legal service. A role as advisory member or secretary of a governing body is also conceivable. At the outset, we jointly define what form makes sense for you and how the collaboration is invoiced — transparent and without surprises.

For whom this model is suitable

The external legal department is particularly suited to SMEs without their own legal service, to foundations, associations, and umbrella organisations with voluntarily led governing bodies, to non-profit organisations with tight resources and high demands for transparency, as well as to growing companies for which an own position is still too early but ad-hoc mandates already too little. Existing legal departments also bring me in when capacity is missing or an independent second opinion is called for.

Frequently asked questions

FAQ — External Legal Department

For SMEs, foundations, and associations that do not want to build up their own legal department but have regular need for legal support. Advantage over one-off mandates: the adviser knows your structures, contracts, and topics and can respond quickly when needed — without having to reacquaint themselves each time.

Typically: ongoing contract review, answers to day-to-day questions, preparation of meetings, contribution to governance matters, representation in negotiations, support of special projects. The strategic component — what fits the organisation, what does not? — also frequently comes in, particularly in dynamic phases.

Usually according to time spent at the agreed hourly rate, with detailed monthly invoicing. For plannable volumes, a retainer agreement is also possible, in which a certain quota of hours per month is reserved. I adapt the model to the size and dynamics of your organisation.

My background covers foundations and associations, smaller service and consulting companies, art and culture projects, as well as sustainability- and animal welfare-oriented organisations. With the further training in complementary consulting, I bring — alongside the legal perspective — also a view on group-dynamic and ethical aspects.

Videos on the topic

In conversation

When is it advisable to involve legal questions early?

Show transcript

Marie Anouk: Regarding your external legal department — when is it advisable to involve legal questions early?

Antoine F. Goetschel: It seems to me very practical to seek outside support as early as possible. A change of perspective — the openness to talk to someone with an external view — very often proves its worth, and when neglected, as a closed door. Through conversations with friends in reputation management I frequently see companies unable to assess the impact of their own decisions: who they choose as spokesperson, how they argue externally, how they respond to the growing importance of media and social media. Employment contracts and project descriptions should also comply with the law rather than simply being copied from old templates. For all these reasons I regard it as entirely practical for a company to obtain ongoing external legal advice. Where my own expertise has limits I work with specialists — in trademark law or in the international arena.

What risks arise from postponing legal matters for too long?

Show transcript

Marie Anouk: What risks arise from postponing legal matters for too long?

Antoine F. Goetschel: One hopes they resolve themselves. Some concerns do — if an aggressive lawyer's letter arrives and you let it sit for a few days and allow what I call the Prussian night to pass before replying, some problems arising from negative emotion dissolve on their own. In tax law, however, the costs of failing to report can be far higher when undeclared money in an estate community is not disclosed promptly. Smouldering conflicts can also erupt. It seems wise to sense, recognise and articulate concerns early — in employment law too, when things start to slip, when overtime breeds mistrust — to address it, regulate it and reframe it.

How do you help companies prioritise legal matters?

Show transcript

Marie Anouk: How do you help companies prioritise legal matters?

Antoine F. Goetschel: I want to warn against over-weighting legal questions. In America — my brother lives there — people sometimes say «lawyers are useless»: the moment lawyers appear, everything becomes heavy and hundred-page contracts appear that no one understands. As a Swiss or European company, if you find the right balance and keep the economic focus primary, part of that balance is regularly weeding the legal landscape. Every person must keep their own garden in order. Some employment contracts are no longer fit for purpose, or land badly in public or with shareholders. Golden parachutes that may once have been contractually agreed are now problematic. It pays to entrust accumulated contractual arrangements to an external legal body — external, because advisers are not subject to instructions, and an internal employee who uncovers a problem risks her own position in a badly run company. External review often yields a clearer answer.

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Personal conversation

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Notice

New office address from 1 August 2026

From 1 August 2026 you will find me at Theaterstrasse 2, 8400 Winterthur — in a Jugendstil villa a few minutes' walk from the main station.