Bio

Advises shareholders on a wide range of activism matters, drawing on experience as adviser to public companies and Delaware Supreme Court law clerk. As a member of the Recruiting Committee, serves as one of the firm’s Hiring Partners. Sean counsels shareholders across the activism spectrum on the assessment of investment opportunities, capital deployment and investment execution, private engagement, settlement negotiations and cooperation agreements, alternative activism strategies, proxy contests, hostile takeovers, and contested M&A transactions. In addition to first-time and occasional activists, he has advised several of the nation’s leading engaged investors, including Carl Icahn, Corvex Management, D. E. Shaw & Co., Elliott Management, JANA Partners, Land & Buildings, Sachem Head Capital Management, Starboard Value, Trian Partners, and Voce Capital Management. As a complement to his representations of shareholders, Sean has experience counseling boards of directors and management teams on shareholder activism preparedness and defense, hostile takeover response, investor engagement, crisis management, and corporate governance matters. He has also advised issuers and private equity sponsors on M&A transactions, shareholder challenges to announced deals, and other contested situations. His work with directors and executives of some of the world’s most recognizable brands, including Avis Budget Group, Bristol-Myers Squibb, Tribune Publishing, Vitamin Shoppe, and Wynn Resorts, informs his guidance to investors. During his career, Sean has advised on the largest director election proxy contest in history and successfully defended the biggest M&A transaction ever subject to a proxy contest. Sean’s writings on shareholder activism and corporate governance have featured in Bloomberg Law, the Delaware Journal of Corporate Law, and the Harvard Law School Forum on Corporate Governance, among other publications. He has also spoken at Harvard Law School, the New York University School of Law, and the University of Pennsylvania Law School on related topics.