Position: Corporate Counsel, State and Local Government & Education (SLED)
Company: VMware
Location: Atlanta, Georgia OR Reston, Virginia
Description:
Corporate Counsel, State and Local Government & Education (SLED) – Worldwide Sales Legal Team
The VMware Legal Department is a team of dedicated legal professionals who share a passion and enthusiasm to both understand and successfully navigate every aspect of our fast-growing company. VMware’s market-leading and evolving businesses routinely present complex legal challenges that demand creative solutions and allow each member of the department to impact the business. The legal team believes in maintaining the highest standards of business and professional conduct, while providing our clients with innovative and pragmatic advice to strengthen and enhance VMware’s competitive market position. If you are looking for a legal department where you can be a team builder, a team player and a leader, all while providing real world solutions to complex problems for the Company’s executives who share a high-level of intellect, confidence and professionalism, then you have found the place.
This position will report directly to the Assistant General Counsel & Director for Government, Education, and Healthcare, Americas WWSLT. This position will provide legal advice and counsel to internal State and Local & Education (“SLED”) clients at all levels, provide transactional support for software licensing, services and cloud businesses, and support day-to-day initiatives and long-term strategies of VMware. The ideal candidate will be comfortable with advising senior decision-makers and able to work independently across the organization at multiple levels. The position will be located in VMware’s Reston, VA or Atlanta, GA office.
Primary Responsibilities:
- Be an embedded part of, and acting as a trusted advisor to, the Vice President of SLED Sales and provide ongoing counsel while bringing ideas that help to define broader business strategy and direction
- Serve as the primary legal point of contact for Government Relations and Ethics and Compliance for SLED Sales.
- Provide support to internal Deal Management and Contract Teams to draft, review, and negotiate a broad range of agreements, including software license, maintenance, cloud computing, mobility, hosting, professional services, RFP, teaming, prime/subcontracts and other state and local government and education contracts
- Collaborate and partner effectively with internal business clients to advise on a wide range of legal topics including applicable state and local procurement laws, and contractual rights, obligations and liabilities.
- Provide interpretation of terms and conditions, and make practical and pragmatic recommendations based on a risk analysis, ensuring adherence to company policies including revenue recognition
- Lead and set the agenda for the SLED legal and contracts virtual team to share best practices, identify opportunities to improve processes, manage special projects, and strategically support the SLED business.
- Interface with various groups to understand key IP, commercial and finance requirements and ensure contractual terms comply with corporate directives, policies and procedures
- Keep abreast of applicable laws, government regulations and industry guidance that impact the software, service, cloud and mobility businesses, and assist in the design and implementation of appropriate policies to ensure compliance
- Support compliance in day-to-day sales activities, including providing training and counseling to sales professionals and other internal clients and coordinating with other groups within the Legal Department on compliance matters
- Collaborate and partner effectively with the business, including providing advice and counsel to executives and sales professionals on issues related to public sector contracts and programs
- Manage outside counsel as applicable and lead and/or participate in special projects within the Legal Department as assigned, including efforts to develop, implement and enhance processes and policies that improve transaction velocity without material increase in risk and to help create and deliver training
Contact: Miriam Drummond
mdrummond@vmware.com
Qualifications: The individual we seek will be a bright, strategic, broad-based business-minded attorney with meaningful state and local government procurement experience and ideally from either a company known for excellence in its commercial legal activities or from a state or local government agency that focuses on procurement of commercial information technology. He or she will have a minimum of eight years legal experience comprised of time spent at a major law firm, in-house with a multinational corporation, and/or a government agency. The successful candidate will be:
- An experienced commercial attorney with demonstrated capability handling complex public sector and commercial legal transactions, with a special emphasis on state and local government procurement law.
- An excellent negotiator with strong influencing skills and experience drafting complex technology and public sector contracts
- Of the highest degree of personal and professional integrity and ethics
- A practical and proactive problem-solver who is confident, mature and calm under fire. This person will possess a high degree of emotional intelligence and be able to interact with executives at the VP-level within VMware
- A well-rounded, engaging and personable individual with demonstrated leadership ability who will be well-received within and outside VMware and has experience working with a geographically dispersed team of legal professionals
Requirements:
- JD from an accredited U.S. law school; member in good standing of a U.S. State bar
- At least 8 years legal experience at a major law firm and/or in-house at a multinational corporation and/or at a government agency drafting, managing and negotiating a variety of public sector agreements within the IT sector, with an emphasis on software licensing, service and cloud agreements
- Excellent negotiator with strong influencing skills and a talent for non-confrontational, win-win negotiations
- Must have excellent verbal and written communication skills with ability to distill complex issues clearly and communicate well both one-on-one and in groups
- An exceptional critical thinker who possesses strong business acumen and excellent judgment; must be able to work independently and juggle multiple priorities in a fast-paced high-growth environment
- Must have excellent interpersonal and presentation skills
- Demonstrated leadership ability
- Of the highest degree of personal and professional integrity and ethics