Description:
Requirements:Travel Requirements:
- Minimal travel, 20% or less
- Domestic trips to CA, TX, KY, TN, IN, IL, OH, GA
- International trips to Canada and Mexico
- Must be willing and available to travel to such locations and with such frequency as is necessary and desirable to meet business needs.
Work Environment Requirements
With reasonable accommodation:
- Must be able to operate a personal computer, telephone, and other office equipment.
- Must perform job duties onsite, when necessary, except those duties that are customarily or by their nature performed offsite (for example, offsite customer visits).
- Must be able to work effectively in a fast-paced environment.
- Must be able to work on multiple assignments at once, and complete assignments within deadline and budget (if applicable) with satisfactory quality.
- Must be able to operate as an effective team member.
- Must be committed to a high standard of safety and be willing and able to comply with all safety laws and all company safety policies.
- Mostly sedentary
- Light work.
- Occasional lifting of between 15lbs – 30lbs.
Attendance/Work Hour Requirements
- Must maintain an acceptable attendance record.
- Must be willing and available to work weekends and holidays as necessary and desirable to meet business needs.
Position Responsibilities:
Legal:
- Legal review of commercial and transactional documents.
- Legal review of markups of commercial and transactional documents.
- Draft commercial and transactional documents.
- Maintain Company employee expectations and communicate effectively with Company employees concerning commercial and transactional document reviews and lead times
- Provide advice and counsel to Company employees on legal issues relating to commercial and transactional documents, negotiations, and contract disputes.
- Work closely and collaborate with Company employees while negotiating contracts and transactions.
- Work to negotiate with customers, suppliers, vendors, and other outside parties, ensuring that the Company's legal position is protected
- Manage and oversee legal vendors and law firms concerning assignment of contract reviews and legal work.
- Report to General Counsel on all ongoing projects and activities, including contract negotiations and the status of contract review and legal support provided for contract disputes
- Provide training to Company employees regarding contract best practices
- Collaborate with and facilitate cross-team decision-making among the legal team, business teams, and other internal teams
- All other duties as assigned
Contract Document Review:
- Monitor and oversee the Company's cloud-based contract queue daily.
- Monitor and oversee the legal department's email address dedicated to contract issues.
- General review of contract documents received in queue on a timely basis.
- Assessment and determination of how to handle contracts.
- Triage and assignment of contracts to internal and external counsel for legal review.
- Coordinate and facilitate communication of legal reviews between internal/external counsel and team members.
- Maintain Company employee expectations and communicate effectively with Company employees concerning contract reviews and lead times.
- Issue legal approvals or denials for contracts.
- Consistently update cloud-based queue daily regarding the status of contracts.
- Supervise and manage outside counsel's review of contracts (i.e., nonlegal issues like timing, cost, facilitation of needed information, etc..).
- Training team members on using the contract document review program.
- Any other tasks related to the Contract Document Review Program as needed.
Contract Lifecycle Management:
- Monitor and oversee the Company's contract lifecycle management software.
- Upload, tag, and organize executed contracts as needed.
- Work with team members to assist in uploading of all executed contracts.
- Work with team members to ensure the tagging and organization of all executed contracts.
- Work with the Company in helping to identify contract champions at each of its locations as needed.
- Work with Company contract champions to train and facilitate proper contract lifecycle management system usage.
- Upload, tag, and organize executed contracts as needed.
- Work with the Company and its team members to locate, obtain, and upload legacy contracts at each location.
- Any other tasks related to the Contract Lifecycle Program as needed.
Standardized Contracts:
- Oversee and manage all Company's standardized contracts.
- Ability to identify needs for additional standardized contract documents.
- Update and revise standardized contracts as directed by internal counsel.
- Oversee and manage the Company's Standardized eContract System.
- Train team members on the proper use and employment of standardized contracts.
- Assist team members with using and implementing standardized contracts as needed.
- Any other tasks related to standardized contracts as needed
Tracking & Metrics:
- Track key performance metrics concerning the contract document review program.
- Track legal vendor and law firm performance.
- Provide regular reports on contract document review program metrics to the General Counsel, senior management, and Japan headquarters.
- Any other tasks related to tracking and metrics as needed.
Required Skills and Abilities:
Essential Skills and Experience:
- 5+ years of verifiable prior experience in an in-house legal department reviewing contracts and providing advice and counsel on contracts and transactions.
- Prior experience managing or participating in an organization's enterprise-wide contract document review program.
- Strong business acumen and proficiency in supply chain issues are essential.
- Outstanding client service mentality.
- Ability to manage many contracts simultaneously (100+).
- Good with technology and software applications
- Ability to manage client expectations
- Strong verbal and written communication skills
- Ability to work independently and show initiative
- Detail oriented
- Strong attention to detail with a factual and legal analytic capability
- Ability to interact effectively with individuals of varied backgrounds and skill levels
- Comfortable with aggressive and proactive defense strategies
- Ability to maintain confidentiality
- Impeccable communication, both written and verbal, with strong negotiation skills
- Proficient in Microsoft Office, Word, Excel, PowerPoint, etc.… Including the ability to “track changes” and redline documents
Beneficial Skills and Experience
- Prior experience providing legal advice to manufacturing clients while in-house counsel or in private practice
- Prior experience providing legal advice to automotive supplier clients while in-house counsel or in private practice
- Prior experience with Japanese companies.
- Prior experience with an enterprise-wide contract document review and contract lifecycle management program.
- Prior experience with intellectual property and legal issues relating to trade secrets, cybersecurity, data privacy, and confidentiality.
- Japanese language capabilities
- Contract Management Software
- Form Building Software
Education/Training/Certifications
- J.D is required
- MBA, or Undergraduate in Business Administration is preferred