Assistant General Counsel, It & Corporate

Overview of Position
We are looking for an experienced and dynamic commercial attorney with initiative and drive who can handle a high volume of varied and complex legal work. Ideal candidates will demonstrate an entrepreneurial approach to issue spotting and problem solving, with a keen eye toward constantly improving internal processes and creatively balancing commercial and compliance risks.
Specifically, the Assistant General Counsel will:

• Support our business teams with a special focus on advising our information technology department – which in turn ensures a variety of critical capabilities used throughout our overall enterprise

• Advise business owners of the key risks of a proposed project or contract, including the legal and regulatory issues that need to be addressed early in the process, and coordinate with cross functional teams (e.g., tax, insurance, privacy and information security) in order to provide comprehensive contractual risk assessment and risk management
• Review, draft and negotiate a broad array of vendor purchasing and services contracts, including SaaS and other hosted services agreements, data privacy and data protection agreements, software license agreements, managed services agreements, master service or consulting agreements along with related work orders / statements of work (SOW), reseller agreements, staff augmentation agreements, and confidentiality / non-disclosure agreements, as well as other commercial transactional agreements from time to time (but excluding real property leases and other real estate matters)

• Support the procurement function with process improvement, template development and training, and
• Analyze and understand parties’ obligations under commercial contracts and work with business partners to enforce vendor obligations and mitigate our legal risks, including advising on and participating in pre-litigation dispute resolution
• Assist on an ad hoc basis with other corporate projects.

As a member of our diverse legal team, the successful candidate will counsel internal clients concerning legal and business matters arising from agreements required for our enterprise operations from our retail stores to our distribution and store-support facilities. Counsel will maintain excellent working relationships with business partners, company legal colleagues, outside counsel and other stakeholders and ensure that the clients’ legal needs are fully satisfied.
This AGC position contributes to our goal of creating and implementing best-practice legal policies and procedures that help our law department become a world-class high-performing organization. The position may offer the opportunity to supervise paralegals and provide advice, coaching and mentoring to team members and peers.
What will be my duties and responsibilities in this job?

• Draft memoranda, e-mails, letters and other documents to ensure clarification on legal language or contract terms and conditions
• Where required, timely obtain and incorporate input on commercial contracts from subject-matter experts that may include outside counsel engaged for issue-specific assistance
• Give accurate and timely counsel to the different internal business units and executives in a variety of legal topics including analysis of the company’s position in case of contract disputes
• Maintain current knowledge of changes in business law, contracts legislation and other regulations to ensure the company conducts its business according to applicable federal and state laws and regulations
• Draft, review, and revise contracts and advise on contracts and other transactional agreements that are often subject to quick turnaround times
• Keep business units and any others involved properly and timely informed of the progress and status of the contracts assigned to you
• Foster a workplace with the highest ethical and legal standards to deliver an environment that promotes mutual respect and inclusion, innovation, and creativity with the expected degree of confidentiality, integrity, responsibility, and excellence in client service
• Perform such other tasks and duties as may be required or assigned from time to time in the company’s discretion
• Advise the business on contract interpretation, terms, issues, risks and negotiating strategies, protecting confidential and privileged information and safeguarding company IP, employee and customer data, and other assets
• Assist in improving and maintaining contract workflows, document management databases, and document retention procedures for contracts and other company records

What are the requirements needed for this position?

• Excellent interpersonal skills with an ability to provide sound, clear legal advice to clients.
• Substantial specific experience negotiating, reviewing, revising and drafting complex IT contracts (as a customer)
• Proven experience working in a high-volume environment with ability to manage simultaneous projects in an efficient and timely manner while working independently, with minimum supervision and direction.
• Broad, “generalist” legal knowledge that allows for expeditious problem identification and resolution and a practical, business-oriented approach to legal issues
• Admission to practice in good standing (including CLE requirements) as a member of a U.S. state or territory
• Eight (8) plus years of experience providing legal counsel on commercial transactions to clients in-house and/or at a large law firm.
• Juris Doctor Degree from an ABA accredited law school with high academic credentials
• Outstanding verbal and written communication skills, advanced knowledge of the law and attention to detail and good record-keeping
• Acquired business acumen to support risk management and navigation of organizational relationships

What other skills/experience would be helpful to have?

• Knowledge and experience in contracting processes, lifecycle and administration including use of CLM systems and creating and providing training on contract templates
• Familiarity with corporate policies, authorizations, internal structures and reorganizations, finance and insurance, and other corporate transactional matters
• Experience handling pre-litigation contract disputes on behalf of business units
• Knowledge of the legal and regulatory environment as it relates to the information technology services, such as relevant IT industry and cyber security standards and practices (e.g., SOC reports and ISO certifications) and subject matter expertise in data privacy laws and regulations (e.g., CPRA, HIPAA)