Big Law, Big Apple

05/15/2018

Asha M. Natarajan (’12), an associate at DLA Piper in New York City, is a self-described “unicorn.”

“I don’t do traditional work per se, but within DLA, there have been unique health care opportunities, so it works! A key takeaway from my career is finding the right balance between adding value by developing niche expertise versus having several colleagues with similar expertise to bounce ideas and questions off of.”

In her role, the 32-year-old Atlanta, Georgia, native works on a range of health care and FDA regulatory matters related to pharmaceutical and medical device companies and managed care organizations.

About half of Natarajan’s time is currently devoted to secondments (working temporarily for another company) with Medtronic, one of the largest medical device manufacturers in the world. In this role she supports not one, but two different business groups and gets to work on initiatives involving innovative new business models, such as software solutions. The rest of her time revolves around supporting her DLA clients with compliance investigations, monitoring and other fraud and abuse issues.

Working in compliance allows her to appreciate her clients’ operational considerations and come up with creative solutions in complicated scenarios. “Compliance is relied on maybe even more so than legal as a business partner,” she said. “It’s a different approach to applying the same laws.”

One of her current projects is working with a large pharmaceutical manufacturer to proactively monitor communications such as emails that sales and marketing teams create —ensuring that it all complies with federal requirements. The emails are first processed through a software that flags certain potentially problematic terms (terms that she helped come up with) to spot potential issues in real-time before they come to fruition.

“You get to learn how reps are actually communicating and where their risks are in a very grassroots way,” she said.

Other projects she has worked on include, for example, doing investigations with a diabetes team, working with a client on robotics technology and working with another client developing a new ADD medication.

For one company, Natarajan was responsible for creating a high-level patient-interaction policy that established parameters around when such interactions are appropriate and how they should be conducted. This ensured that the company’s employees “provide critical information to patients with diabetes who may not be aware of treatment options, such as an insulin pump, while remaining within the boundaries of relevant regulation and industry guidance.”

One of her biggest challenges working in big law is the variability in both projects and clients, but that variability is also what makes the job rewarding.

“Law firms often get the most cutting-edge work, and in an evolving industry like health care, it’s exciting to be a part of a team that is helping a diverse set of clients grow their business while mitigating legal and compliance risks.”

Despite being six years out of law school, Natarajan puts her SLU LAW education to work every day. “We had an entire class on the Stark Law and the Anti-Kickback Statute and learned why it makes health care business just so much more high risk,” she said. “It was unbelievable to have that working knowledge going into practice. Nearly everything I do has potential fraud and abuse implications in some way.”

Natarajan says she was able to land one of her first jobs in part because the hiring partner specifically sought candidates from prestigious health law programs like the SLU LAW Center for Health Law Studies who could “hit the ground running knowing the basics,” such as the innumerable acronyms that exist in the industry.

“I was on a business team call the other day where I just had to sit there for two hours and spot potential compliance concerns,” she said. “Having that health law foundation when you graduate law school is pretty rare.”

Despite that foundation, working at a law firm was not what Natarajan, who also earned a dual-degree master’s in public health, initially wanted to do upon passing the bar exam.

“I always knew I wanted to do public health,” she said. “I had envisioned myself landing a job in the federal government doing ACA implementation work, but there were no jobs when I graduated in 2012. I did life sciences compliance consulting work for a year in New York City and then decided I wanted that robust law firm training while I was still junior in my career.”

She landed at Foley & Lardner’s New York office, where she was brought in to advise on fraud and abuse, compliance and investigation matters. In May 2016, Natarajan joined DLA Piper and has since been carving out her niche and finding people doing work she wants to be doing.

She now appreciates the opportunities that come with representing big clients.

“It’s really rewarding,” she said. “I think law firms get the most interesting work, and that’s what keeps me here.” Natarajan does still have a “public service bug,” and she exercises those muscles by offering pro bono services to indigent immigrant children in New York faced with deportation through a nonprofit called the Safe Passage Project. She also volunteers at an animal shelter in Manhattan.

And despite big law’s reputation and her passion for the field, she believes life is too short to be consumed exclusively by her work.

“I have a dog and a cat and friends and family I love spending time with,” she said. “At the end of the day, you make time for what’s important to you.”

— By Maria Tsikalas