Shaping Global Legal Leadership Through Judgment, Trust and Influence

Leadership across global markets demands more than legal expertise. It calls for sound judgment, adaptability, business understanding, and the ability to influence decisions in complex environments. For Aisha Ghazi Babar, each transition across private practice, in-house leadership, executive roles, and boardrooms has shaped a leadership approach grounded in purpose and enterprise impact.

In an exclusive interaction with Global Woman Leader Magazine, Aisha shares her perspectives on navigating unfamiliar markets, building credibility, developing a leadership voice, and making principled decisions in high-stakes environments. She also reflects on curiosity, career ownership, and the importance of creating impact without seeking the spotlight.

Aisha currently serves as General Counsel, Chief Compliance Officer, and Corporate Secretary at Pierre Fabre Pharmaceuticals, advising executive teams and boards on legal, compliance, risk, governance, and investigations.

Read the complete article to explore her leadership journey and insights on creating lasting organizational impact.

Q1.Your career spans private practice, global legal leadership, boardrooms, and executive roles. How did each transition redefine your identity as a woman leader beyond the title?

A.During my career, every transition required me to shed a part of myself, to actively unlearn patterns and break the old mold.  I would often visualize building a whole new set of wings in order to adjust to the change in altitude and to keep pace with the execution speed needed.  Transitioning out of private practice and going in-house I often found myself in a state of vulnerability searching for courage when entering unfamiliar rooms and into discussions where I did not have the full context.  At times I had to invite myself into conversations which did not traditionally envisage legal at the table and where comfort had to be established through borrowed trust. It was these moments that brought me closer to pulse of the business and shape the partnership model I was looking to build.   The model continues to evolve and in my current role I find myself thinking like a founder with skin in the game with the executive leadership driving the enterprise mission.  Over the years, I have learnt to serve as a steward of the enterprise, influence and lead through judgement and not hierarchy, and help others perform at their best even in moments of crisis.

Q2.Having repeatedly stepped into unfamiliar geographies and greater responsibilities, how did you cultivate the confidence to let adaptability become your most enduring leadership advantage?

A.Confidence did not arrive before each move- I took the risk to make the move outside my realm of familiarity and every such move reinforced confidence in myself and in my ability to adapt and excel. Every new geography required me to listen first, learn quickly, and resist the temptation to prove myself too early. I began to see adaptability not as changing who I was, but as expanding how I could contribute and what did the circumstances expect from me. Working across Europe, Asia Pacific, Middle East, Africa, and North America, taught me that credibility is built when there is a genuine curiosity for understanding the drivers of the business and a willingness to transform to achieve breakthrough outcomes.

Navigating different legal/ business/regulatory jurisdictions reinforced my belief that growing through discomfort becomes meaningful when the purpose and value proposition are higher than the need for self preservation.

My confidence now comes from knowing that I can enter complexity, learn and unlearn the context, fail and learn how to do things differently, build lasting relationships and feedback loops, and create a path forward with a shared purpose alongside my executive team.

Q3.Your journey reflects influence built through credibility rather than visibility. How did you intentionally shape a leadership voice that commanded trust before authority?

A.Visibility is essential as it creates the platform whereby the credibility that we build through our work is tested and peers have an opportunity to provide valuable feedback and hold us accountable.  What changes over time is being strategic about how and when to be visible.  As a lawyer in private practice for many years, commanding an audience and presenting a case, came naturally - it was second nature. However when I entered the world of business and enterprise, I learnt that I had to listen twice as much as I needed to speak and even then, what I had to offer had to have a “listening” and “resonance” i.e. be relevant for the particular audience with which I was engaging. Transitioning from a functional expert to an enterprise leader, I realized I wasn’t just solving problems. I was equally responsible for organizational culture, mobilizing hearts and minds and creating psychological safety in order to truly understand what was going on in the organization- reading the unwritten codes. This is when I started to become intentional about my leadership impact and would ask myself “was I truly listening”,  “how did I land” “was I effective”?  Authority may open a door, but relevance and impact are what make you stay.  My leadership voice evolved as I learned how to understand needs and the anticipate the problems people were trying to solve.  I had to ask the hard questions and communicate difficult truths but always with respect. Whether advising a regional president, a CEO, or the Board, I focused on bringing clarity, balance, and market-oriented solutions and be someone who helps others think better and operate with confidence.

Q4.Across every chapter, you've balanced commercial ambition with principled judgment. How has that internal compass evolved as your responsibilities expanded and expectations intensified?

A.At first, my internal compass began with a simple belief: legal and compliance functions should protect integrity without becoming barriers to progress. As my responsibilities expanded, that belief became more sophisticated and I was humbled by the fact that the compass has to remain flexible and that in addition to protecting the organization, co-owning risk and business outcomes was a key part of the mandate! In highly regulated, high-stakes environments, the pressure to move quickly can be intense, but speed without trust (both with internal and external stakeholders) is rarely sustainable and business without risk is just not competitive enough. Leadership is often tested in the grey areas, where courage, context, and long-term thinking matter most and that’s where my compass now ensures that partnership and timely collaboration are essential to ensure the best outcomes.

Q5.You have consistently advised CEOs and Boards while remaining behind many pivotal decisions. How do women transform quiet influence into lasting organizational impact without seeking the spotlight?

A.Quiet influence becomes lasting impact when it shapes systems, decisions, and people.  In my early days, I too was seeking external validation, I did seek the spotlight and thrived in environments where I was being acknowledged and appreciated.  This is all part of the growth journey.  With time and suffered experience, along with a few grey hairs, I began to trust myself more and appreciate the impact I was helping create behind the closed doors, the shaping of outcomes through consensus and the trust that was being built through difficult conversations.  I began to pave the way for others, empower teams, lead decisively and create space for emerging talent. Women do not need to seek the spotlight to be powerful, but they must ensure their contribution is visible through outcomes. The impact comes from asking the question others had missed, reframing the issue, or creating a solution that allowed the business to move forward responsibly.  However, as many have already written, quiet influence should not mean maintaining silence or self-erasure. It means choosing substance over performance, documenting results, building sponsors, and developing others. A lasting legacy is created when your judgment eventually becomes embedded in how an organization thinks and operates on a regular basis. 

Q6.Your career demonstrates that leadership often means asking better questions rather than delivering faster answers. How has curiosity become one of your most powerful executive strengths?

A.Being curious for the sake of staying up to date and in the know can actually be quite a nuisance.  Being genuinely curious requires hard work.  It requires us to first to take interest in a subject matter of relevance or organizational significance and then demonstrate endurance in staying curious - in complex legal and business environments, the real issue sits beneath the question being asked. Instead of seeking information first, I try and invest time in absorbing the business context, pausing before asking and setting enterprise goals before seeking alignment.  Curiosity turns insight into informed action but only in environments that are conducive.  Leadership requires us to create the conditions for better answers to emerge and ideas to be adopted and this is something I continue to strive toward.

Q7.Moving across continents, organizations, and cultures requires continuously reinventing yourself. How did you preserve your authentic leadership identity while adapting to entirely different professional environments.

A.Moving across continents and navigating different cultures and methods has first taught me the importance of ensuring common vision and purpose within the family unit.  Secondly, humility and the power of inclusion: every system has something to teach you, and no single leadership style works everywhere.  In new environments and when onboarding,  it is critical to be included in the right circles of trust and insight (not gossip and grapevine) to truly learn the local dynamics. Authenticity in such circumstances could not show up as rigidity I.e “this is how I do things / my way or the highway!” I had to demonstrate confidence in my skill set,  remain grounded in my values while being flexible enough to meet people where they are and understand their perspective.  In one environment, directness created clarity and I was excited to get to the point straight away! In another, I had to be listening and relationship-building first and business came later. No matter the culture or the jurisdiction, what was eventually required from me by the enterprise did not change- clear and effective communication, building consensus, understanding risk preparing for mitigation and influencing critical outcomes within short timelines.  

Q8Looking back over twenty-five years, what personal belief about ambition, success, or leadership did you intentionally unlearn, and how did that reshape the leader you became?

A.My coach once told me “You are the CEO of your career”.  I found it hard earlier on in my life to adopt this way of thinking as I believed that good work gets recognized no matter what and creating development pathways is the role of a good manager.   This is a recipe for stagnation and living with unrealized potential.  Now I understand what it means to be the CEO of your own career. You have to own your strengths, acknowledge your areas of improvement, find partners, sponsors, mentors to be sounding boards and thought partners and find the courage to own your own development and create your success.

Last Word: For women aspiring to influence boardrooms without compromising authenticity, what enduring principle would you encourage them to build their careers and leadership legacy upon?

Stay true to the enterprise mission and speak from a place of ownership.  Not everyone will understand what you have to say immediately and many will doubt your intentions.  Many will have opinions about what you said, when and how you showed up, how you were perceived. Listen to it all, soak it all up, acknowledge it all as good data, then decide how much of it belongs in your arsenal of growth and improvement and how much of it needs to be placed your rear-view mirror. Give yourself the space to self reflect and then continue to show up for who you want to become. Boardrooms are not the place where all executive matters get resolved- a lot of that is taken care of by the day operations of the executive team. However Boardrooms definitely provide a forum where lasting impressions and perceptions can be created.  When in the room, participate, take interest, co-own the agenda, contribute meaningfully and ask the question that no one else may have the courage to ask, but do it for the sake of the enterprise and stay open to the learning in the process. You are in that room because you have earned your seat.