What It Takes to Be an Elite Lawyer

Adam Mendler is a nationally recognized authority on leadership, renowned for his unique ability to deliver perspective-shifting insights shaped by interviewing more than 500 of America’s most successful leaders. The creator and host of the top-rated business and leadership podcast Thirty Minute Mentors, Adam regularly elicits insights from America's top CEOs, founders, athletes, celebrities, and political and military leaders. A keynote speaker to businesses, universities, and non-profit organizations, Adam has written extensively on business and leadership, having authored more than 70 articles published in major media outlets including Forbes, Inc., and HuffPost. A Los Angeles native and lifelong Angels fan, Adam teaches graduate-level courses on leadership at UCLA, serves on the board of UCLA’s Master of Applied Statistics & Data Science program, is an emeritus member of USC’s Board of Governors, and is an advisor to numerous companies and leaders.

Robert Giuffra is Co-Chair of Sullivan & Cromwell and a partner in the firm’s Litigation Group. He has served on Sullivan & Cromwell’s Management Committee since 2007. Mr. Giuffra joined the firm in 1989 after serving as a law clerk to Chief Justice William Rehnquist of the U.S. Supreme Court and to Judge Ralph Winter of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit. He focuses on “bet-the-company,” securities, white-collar criminal, product liability, commercial, insurance, banking, and tax litigation. A fellow of the American College of Trial Lawyers and the International Academy of Trial Lawyers, Mr. Giuffra is recognized as one of the leading litigators in the United States. The American Lawyer has selected him as “Litigator of the Year” (2014), “Transatlantic Disputes/Regulatory Lawyer of the Year” (2017), and as “Litigator of the Week” ten times since June 2011, most recently in April 2026. The National Law Journal has named him a “Winning Litigator” (2015), an “Energy and Environmental Trailblazer” (2017), a “Litigation Trailblazer” (2015), and a “Crisis Leadership Trailblazer” (2021). He is an eleven-time Law360 MVP (2011, 2013, 2015, 2016, 2017, 2018, 2019, 2020, 2021, 2022, 2024), the most for any lawyer since Law360 started naming MVPs. Euromoney has named him a “Top 100 Trial Lawyer” and “National Star” in Benchmark: America's Leading Litigation Firms and Attorneys and one of the top 30 litigators in the 2019 Best of the Best USA Expert Guide. Chambers USA named him a 2024 “Star Individual” in New York Securities Litigation. In 2012, The International Who’s Who Legal listed him as one of its ten “Most Highly Regarded” litigators globally. In 2011, The Financial Times profiled him as one of its ten leading U.S. legal innovators. For over 25 years, Mr. Giuffra has represented prominent corporations and individuals in their most challenging civil and criminal cases, including at jury and bench trials, and on appeal in federal and state courts around the United States, before arbitration panels, and in investigations involving the U.S. Department of Justice, the SEC, the EPA, the Department of Homeland Security, U.S. and non-U.S. bank regulators, the U.S. Congress, all fifty State Attorneys General, and the Internal Revenue Service. He regularly advises senior executives and boards of directors in internal governance matters.