Patricia R. Hatler leverages her 25 years as a national leader and senior executive in the insurance industry to assist a wide range of clients in transactional, litigation, regulatory compliance and corporate governance matters.
Prior to joining the firm, Pat served for 17 years as chief legal and governance officer for Nationwide Mutual Insurance Company, a Fortune 100 company with annual revenues of US$25 billion. In that role she was responsible for operations and financial management of six divisions with a staff of 1,400, including the legal, corporate secretary, federal and state government relations, corporate citizenship and corporate compliance functions. During her tenure at Nationwide she provided advice and counsel through the transitions of three chief executive officers, three board chairs, four chief financial officers and numerous business unit presidents.
Some of her key achievements while at Nationwide include providing legal and regulatory support for Nationwide’s mergers and acquisitions; creating the infrastructure for Nationwide’s implementation of the regulatory requirements under the Dodd Frank Act; leading an industry coalition that secured unanimous approval of both chambers of Congress to amend Dodd Frank’s capital requirements to better reflect state-regulated insurance practices; representing the interests of Nationwide in the significant litigation and regulatory inquiries that followed Hurricane Katrina; and creating the company’s first centralized compliance unit.
She served as chair of the board of directors of the Association of Corporate Counsel (ACC), the premier in-house bar association for professional corporate counsel who practice in legal departments globally. As such she led the organization successfully through a significant leadership transition and served as a vocal and effective advocate for the ACC’s Value Challenge Program, which has become a model for ensuring efficient and effective use of outside counsel to support the needs of major corporations.
