In-House Senior Legal Counsel • TOP Global IT Company • Tokyo Japan
- Recruiter
- Found Legal
- Location
- Tokyo
- Salary
- Salary above market, bonus, medical insurance for family, life assurance, long term disability cover
- Posted
- 04 Dec 2018
- Closes
- 16 Dec 2018
- Ref
- 20189
- Vacancy Type
- Solicitors, Private Practice, In-House, Barristers, Private Practice, In-House
- Contract
- Permanent
- Hours
- Full Time
- Practice Areas
- Company/Commercial, Competition/EU, Data Protection, Energy, Information Technology, Intellectual Property, Media/Entertainment/Sport, PPP/PFI/Commercial projects, Telecoms, Transport (Including aviation and shipping), Travel and Tourism
- Experience Level
- Junior Level, Mid Level, Partner, Partner-designate, Senior Executive, Senior Level
In House (Senior) Legal Counsel
TOP Global IT Company
Tokyo, Japan
Company
Our client is a highly sought after technology employer with a 300-strong global legal team.
New roles
Due to the continuous business growth and internal promotions they are looking to hire a talented lawyer to be based in their offices in Tokyo.
This is an excellent chance to join a highly regarded legal team that is central to a dynamic, fast moving global business in an exciting and varied commercial role.
People and Culture
The management has succeeded in creating an exceptionally supportive and collaborative corporate culture that helps people thrive.
The quality of people is outstanding – the organisation is very selective. 92% of employees are proud to tell others they work there. Most of the people who have worked here consider their years at the company to be the best years of their lives.
There is a strong focus around culture, integrity and respect for the individual – the atmosphere is trusting and empowering.
Legal Team
This legal team is known for its remarkable collegiality. There is great camaraderie at all levels, people are friendly and helpful. The team like each other and there is a very low level of politics.
The team features some of the brightest legal professionals in their sector. The scale of the team allows for huge expertise in every area. The legal department follows the company structure which is organised by function which ensures the people with the correct experience are handling each matter.
GC
The GC is held in awe and admiration by his team - he is funny, strategic, intelligent and hard-working. His philosophy is to “hire people smarter than himself”. This attitude is cascaded down to Regional Legal Directors and the GC acknowledges that the team members are the pillars of the success of the legal function.
Legal Innovation
The legal team are a truly innovative bunch, having started using advanced technology for legal processes already back in 2005.
As a new member of the team you will find the degree of sharing of knowledge and resources truly amazing.
Every conceivable task has been automated. The tracking of contracts is brilliant; the approval process is totally automated; no lawyer has touched a standard NDA since 2005 and no lawyer ever has to chase a contract signature or copy – it is all taken care of by a specialist global function.
There is constant sharing of information and experience.
Some of the current legal innovation projects include:
- Digitizing legal (e.g. currently the team are developing a dashboard to sit on your home screen with an overview of all key contract info - so you do not have to manually go through contracts).
- Catching the legal know-how.
- Being part of global legal innovation team - how can we do better what we do and what does not work?
Value of in-house counsel
In-house counsel here are business enablers and often the people recommending a decision to their executive teams — and in some cases making the judgment calls themselves. The legal team is viewed and respected as business enablers, strategic agents and opportunity makers.
Role
This role handles complex commercial legal matters including high value high complexity commercial contracts. The work is varied and exciting – the company operates at the absolute forefront of their sector.
You will act as a trusted legal advisor to the business (structuring complex high value sales transactions, negotiating and drafting a wide range of legal agreements, responding to complex RFI/RFP requests, giving accurate advice to senior management on the legal and commercial impact of specific contractual provisions and general legal matters, engaging in cross-functional projects as a legal subject matter expert etc).
This is a big role actively shaping (not just supporting) hugely complex deals across. The admin and more simple work is carried out by interns and more junior team members.
There is a lot of responsibility and autonomy in the role - the business trusts local legal counsel to make important decisions locally.
Development and career
This is a perfect company in which to really develop and push yourself. The legal team enjoys excellent regular training and huge personal development opportunities.
If you are interested in progressing in your career, moving abroad or have an interest in another legal area, it is easy to do so.
What we are looking for
- Ideally experience within the Technology or Telecommunications sector
- (We will consider candidates from other sectors)
- Fluent Japanese speaker and drafter
What can you expect?
- A clear career path right from the start
- Only high quality high value transactional legal work (admin and routine tasks and contracts such as NDAs are either automated or outsourced to a supporting team)
- Apart from very good salary and significant bonus the company provides medical insurance for you, your spouse/partner and dependent children, life assurance, long term disability cover, pension, profit sharing participation, meal vouchers, employee stock purchase plan etc.
- Longer than usual annual leave
Flexibility
The company offers a lot of flexibility around working from home, start/finish hours etc if preferred. What is important to the manager is that the work gets done, and not how long the team spend in the office - and this attitude shared by the legal team globally.
Recruitment process
We have strong relationship with the hiring team so will advise whether this organisation would be the best fit to your skills, experience and aspirations.
Once shortlisted, will receive extensive preparation and guidance for every interview.
Found Legal practice strict confidentiality in all communication and never share your CV or any other details with any third party until we discuss the opportunity with you.
We look forward to hearing from you.
Suppliers to Fortune 100 and FTSE 100-350 organisations, Found Legal put you in front of dream career opportunities. We focus on placing legal professionals with world-class in-house legal teams globally. If this role is not the right fit, please upload your CV on our website to be updated on new vacancies.