Director, EMEA Legal Services Group

Oracle•Apply•Published 20 hours ago•First seen 14 hours ago

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Role Purpose:

Lead and set the strategic direction for the EMEA Legal Services Group, ensuring the team delivers high-quality, efficient and commercially focused legal support across the region.
Develop the Legal Services Group as a centre of expertise and operational excellence, supporting country-based Legal teams while also providing direct legal support in countries where there is no dedicated local Legal team.
Drive a consistent, scalable and risk-appropriate approach to the delivery of more standardized and process-driven legal work across EMEA.
Partner closely with the Regional Legal VP’s, country Legal teams, business leaders and other stakeholders to ensure that legal resources are deployed effectively and aligned with regional business priorities.

Key Responsibilities:

Leadership:

Define and implement the strategy, priorities and operating model for the EMEA Legal Services Group.
Translate the broader EMEA Legal strategy into clear objectives, service standards and priorities for the team.
Identify opportunities to expand, improve and standardize the services provided by the group.
Establish clear principles for how work is allocated between the Legal Services Group, country Legal teams and other specialist Legal functions.
Act as a senior member of the EMEA Legal leadership community and contribute to regional Legal strategy and planning.
Lead, motivate and develop a geographically dispersed team, with a significant team presence in Bucharest and team members in other EMEA locations.
Build a high-performing, collaborative and service-oriented culture focused on quality, responsiveness, accountability and continuous improvement.
Set clear goals and performance expectations and ensure effective workload management across the team.
Develop team capability through coaching, mentoring, career development and succession planning.
Ensure the team has the appropriate skills, knowledge and capacity to support changing business and Legal requirements across the region.

Support in country legal teams:

Partner with country Legal Directors and Legal teams to understand their requirements and ensure the Legal Services Group provides effective and responsive support.
Develop consistent service offerings and engagement models for work undertaken on behalf of country Legal teams.
Ensure appropriate escalation of complex, high-risk or strategically significant matters to relevant country or regional Legal leadership.
Promote knowledge sharing, common standards and best practices across the EMEA Legal organization.
Oversee and, where appropriate, provide direct legal support to business operations in EMEA countries that do not have a dedicated local country Legal team.
Ensure that legal advice provided in such countries is commercially pragmatic, appropriately risk-based and aligned with regional policies and standards.
Coordinate with specialist Legal colleagues and external counsel where local law expertise or specialist advice is required.
Establish appropriate governance and escalation mechanisms for legal matters arising in countries without local Legal coverage.

Legal process & transactional support:
Lead the delivery of standardized and process-driven legal activities across EMEA, including matters such as:
Non-disclosure and confidentiality agreements.
Assignment, novation and similar agreements.
Standard amendments and other routine contractual documentation.
Other repeatable legal activities suitable for centralized or streamlined handling.
Develop and maintain appropriate templates, playbooks, guidance and escalation criteria.
Ensure appropriate quality control and consistency while enabling matters to be handled efficiently and at the appropriate level within the team.
Work with Legal Operations and other stakeholders to identify opportunities for automation, self-service and technology-enabled legal support.
Establish meaningful performance indicators and service metrics to assess quality, responsiveness, workload, efficiency and stakeholder satisfaction.
Use data and stakeholder feedback to identify areas for improvement and inform resource allocation and service design.
Simplify and standardize processes wherever appropriate, while maintaining suitable legal and risk controls.
Champion the effective use of AI and other technologies, knowledge management and process improvement within the team.
Anticipate changes in business demand and adapt the team's capabilities and operating model accordingly.

Stakeholder management:
Build trusted relationships with the Regional General Counsel, Regional Legal VP’s, country Legal leaders, senior business stakeholders and other Legal and corporate functions.
Act as a senior point of contact for matters relating to the services delivered by the Legal Services Group.
Manage competing priorities across countries and stakeholders, making transparent and risk-based decisions about resource allocation.
Communicate clearly about the team's capabilities, priorities, service levels and escalation processes.

Experience and qualifications:
Qualified lawyer with substantial post-qualification experience gained in a sophisticated in-house Legal function and/or leading law firm.
Significant leadership experience, including responsibility for managing and developing legal professionals or comparable professional-services teams.
Experience working across multiple countries and cultures, ideally within the EMEA region and within a large, complex multinational organization.
Strong experience in commercial and contractual matters, including the ability to distinguish between routine, scalable legal work and matters requiring more senior or specialist legal judgment.
Demonstrated experience in designing, improving or managing legal service-delivery models, shared services, centres of excellence or similar centralized functions would be highly desirable.
Experience of legal operations, process improvement, workflow management, legal technology or automation would be an advantage.

Skills and capabilities:
Strong strategic thinking, with the ability to translate Legal and business priorities into an effective service-delivery model.
Excellent people leadership skills, including the ability to lead teams across different locations, cultures and levels of experience.
Strong legal judgment and the ability to take pragmatic, proportionate and commercially informed approaches to risk.
Excellent stakeholder-management skills and credibility with senior Legal and business leaders.
Strong organizational and prioritization capabilities, with the ability to manage significant volumes of work across multiple jurisdictions.
A continuous-improvement mindset and willingness to challenge existing processes and ways of working.
Strong communication and influencing skills, with the ability to create clarity in a complex matrix organization.
Collaborative and inclusive leadership style, combined with a strong sense of ownership and accountability.
Ability to balance service orientation with appropriate independence of legal judgment and effective risk management.

Measures of success:

High levels of satisfaction and trust among country Legal teams and business stakeholders.
Consistent, timely and high-quality delivery of legal services across EMEA.
Clear and effective allocation of work between the Legal Services Group, country Legal teams and specialist Legal functions.
Increased standardization, simplification and efficiency of repeatable legal activities.
Effective legal coverage for countries without dedicated local Legal teams.
Strong team engagement, development and retention.
Demonstrable improvements in productivity, service quality and the use of legal technology and process automation.

Qualifications

Career Level - M4

Responsibilities

Manages the legal function across geographies and/or within the individual's specialty area(s) to include staff, budgets, financials, strategic plans, and core processes. Manages staff in the development and implementation of department processes, procedures and programs. Ensures adherence to Oracle's processes, procedures and regulatory compliance concerning the department. Participates in development of setting direction and implementation of both short- and long-term goals. Coordinates external counsel on legal matters pertaining to the individual's area(s) of responsibility and/or across larger geographies. Demonstrates in-depth knowledge across a broad range of sub-disciplines within the individual's specialty area(s), covering one or more of the following: general corporate law, antitrust/competition law, securities compliance and regulatory, employment law, immigration law, cloud transactions, data privacy, risk management asset-backed financing, contract management, intellectual property, trade secrets, advertising law, registration and other resolutions specific to the computer and technology industry.

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