GR Director (Government Relations)

Also known as: Government Relations Director, Head of Government Affairs, Head of Public Policy, Public Affairs Director, Regulatory Affairs Director.

What does a GR Director do?

A GR Director is a leader responsible for the company's dialogue with regulators, government bodies and industry associations. For a tech company this is above all about the rules that affect the product: personal data, payments, AI, telecom, platforms and advertising. A GR Director sees early which changes are being prepared and helps the business get ready before they take effect.

• Tracks draft regulation that may affect the product.
• Prepares the company's position for consultations and working groups.
• Represents the company in industry associations.
• Turns upcoming requirements into tasks for product, legal and the business.
• Builds regular, transparent contact with the relevant authorities.

When does a company need a GR Director?

A company needs a GR Director when regulation starts to shape the product: it works with payments, data, telecom, health or AI, enters a market with specific rules for it, or has grown to a size where regulators expect it to have a position. Before that, the CEO and the lawyers usually share GR questions, and at some point they run out of time and expertise. If the product is not affected by industry rules, a dedicated GR Director will not have enough to do: a CLO or an outside regulatory adviser is enough.

GR Director vs CLO: what's the difference?

A GR Director differs from a CLO in when they deal with rules: a CLO interprets the law in force and protects the company in contracts and disputes, while a GR Director takes part in discussing rules while they are still being prepared. So a CLO needs a lawyer's deep knowledge of the law, and a GR Director needs an understanding of how regulators and the industry work. A PR Director differs in audience: PR speaks to the public and the media, GR to regulators and associations.

GR Director vs related roles: comparison

Why is it hard to hire a GR Director?

A GR Director is hard to hire because the market for such specialists is small and tightly bound to a country and an industry.

• Experience with one country's regulators hardly transfers to another: the authorities, procedures and industry bodies all change.
• GR success often looks like "nothing bad happened", so it is hard to show in a CV and hard to verify.
• Companies use the GR title for very different roles, from a regulatory analyst to a head of association relations.
• Experienced GR Directors in an industry all know each other, and a public job search is a reputational risk for them.

What to decide before hiring a GR Director?

• Which regulation matters most for the product in the next two or three years? A payments specialist and a data specialist are different people.
• Which countries does the role cover? This determines whose experience fits at all.
• Who does the GR Director report to, and how do they work with legal and PR? Without this, the roles overlap and compete for the same issues.
• How will the result be measured? Without an agreement up front, it will be hard to tell after a year whether the function works.

Where to find a GR Director?

GR Directors most often come from tech companies, banks, telecom and platforms that already have a GR function, as well as from industry associations and regulatory legal practice. A strong profile signal is work in working groups and associations on a topic that matters for your product, with a clear result of that work for the business. NEWHR looks for such candidates by the results of their work, not by applications to a job post.

How to assess a GR Director in an interview?

A GR Director is assessed through a walkthrough of two or three regulatory issues the candidate handled and a case on the company's product. In the case the candidate names upcoming rules they see as a risk and a plan for the first three months. On the company side the CEO and the CLO or head of legal take part.

Strong signals:

• explains what changed for the business thanks to their work, not just where they took part;
• talks about regulators calmly and to the point, as counterparts with their own goals;
• turns a regulatory question into concrete tasks for the product.

Red flags:

• promises to "sort the issue out" instead of open dialogue through established procedures;
• cannot name a single result that can be checked;
• has a weak grasp of the company's product and business model.

How long does it take to hire a GR Director?

We present the first candidates for the GR Director role within 5–7 days of the brief. The whole search usually takes one to six months.

Related roles

• CLO — works with the law in force, while the GR Director works with rules being prepared.
• CEO — represents the company to regulators personally until there is a GR Director.
• Chief AI Officer — owns AI in the product or in the company's processes and prepares for AI regulation together with the GR Director.
• CISO — implements the technical data protection requirements the GR Director learns about early.