For Marta Sipovičienė, Chief Legal Officer & Member of the Management Team at MailerLite and BMI International Executive MBA Class of 2027 participant, the decision to pursue an Executive MBA came from a clear professional realisation: senior leadership requires more than functional expertise.
Over the past eight years, Marta has built her career in the legal landscape of MailerLite, an international, fully remote IT company. For five of those years, she has served as Chief Legal Officer and member of the management team, working closely with strategic, organisational and business decisions alongside legal matters.
That exposure shaped her leadership perspective, but also revealed the need to broaden her toolkit. In this interview, Marta reflects on why legal thinking alone was no longer enough, what she expects from the EMBA, and why practical, cross-disciplinary learning is already proving valuable.
Could you briefly tell us about your professional journey before deciding to pursue an Executive MBA?
I’ve spent the last eight years navigating the legal landscape at an international, fully remote IT company – MailerLite – and for five of those years I’ve been Chief Legal Officer and member of the management team. As an in-house counsel from early on, I was sitting at the table where strategy, people and business decisions were being made alongside legal ones. That exposure shaped me and also gradually revealed the gaps in my toolkit.
When did you first start considering an EMBA? What prompted the serious decision – why now?
It built up over time. My curiosity kept pulling me beyond the boundaries of legal thinking – and gradually I realized those boundaries simply weren’t enough for me. As a member of the management team, the room demands leadership judgment, organizational understanding and business reasoning that reach well beyond what a legal education gives you. After years in management, I knew I needed a booster.
What challenges do you see and personally experience for leaders today? And what do you expect from EMBA in addressing them?
The biggest challenge I see is that leadership today demands fluency across many domains at once. As a legal professional in a management role, I constantly navigate the intersection of law, business strategy, finance and people. The world doesn’t wait for you. You need to ask the right questions fast, understand the context and contribute meaningfully. My expectation from the EMBA is not to become fluent in finance or marketing. It’s to build enough depth across disciplines to be a better thinking partner to my colleagues, make more confident decisions and serve the business more fully.
What led you to choose BMI Executive Institute specifically? What were your main criteria?
MailerLite is an international business, so thinking beyond local borders isn’t optional for me – it’s part of the job. I wanted a program that reflects that reality: professors from abroad, perspectives from outside our local context, a cohort with real diversity of experience. In legal work, you learn to stress-test ideas from multiple angles. I wanted a program that does the same. BMI felt like that place.
What are you most looking for in your EMBA studies – knowledge, connections, a chance to reset?
If I had to name one thing, it’s the ability to think differently. I want to walk into a strategic discussion and understand the financial logic behind it, the organizational dynamics driving it, the market forces shaping it – not only the legal risks around it. Connections are a wonderful side effect. The reset is real too. Being in a room of peers who are all senior leaders dealing with similar tensions is reassuring and energizing.
Were there any doubts before starting?
Yes – an honest one. I wondered whether a program built around business and management would feel relevant enough for someone with a legal background. Would the frameworks apply? Would I be starting from too far behind in finance or strategy? That doubt itself turned out to be a signal. If everything felt entirely comfortable and familiar, it probably wouldn’t teach me much. So I chose to lean into it.
What can you say about the studies so far? First impressions? Any surprises? Anything worth improving?
What surprised me most was how practical it all is. I expected solid theory – and there is theory – yet the real-world focus is immediate. We’re not studying business in the abstract. We’re working through situations that could happen at my company next quarter. As for things worth improving – it’s early for me to say with full confidence. I will flag one thing, though: the pace is intense for working executives. That’s likely by design, and I respect it. Yet it’s worth acknowledging openly – this demands genuine commitment, not just enrollment.