Corporate Counsel

Purpose:

This position is responsible for ensuring Great Clips’ legal objectives in the U.S. and Canada are met by research and counsel on the many legal issues and risks faced by the company, including legal obligations involving privacy, security, data transfers, and data protection.  Duties include: counsel for risk management in marketing, recruiting, business intelligence and technology initiatives; internal lease review and negotiation; drafting, reviewing, and negotiating vendor contract terms with an emphasis on legal obligations in privacy, security, and technology; establishing and maintaining a company-wide Information Privacy Program, overseeing the implementation, education and maintenance of company-wide contract management and document management systems, and directing the crisis management team, Critical Incident Response Planning, crisis calls, and processes including safety and security.

Key Result Areas:

• Advises executives within the company and works alongside contracting parties to minimize legal risks for a wide variety of agreements including business intelligence and technology, Point of Sale, marketing agreements, confidentiality agreements, and other general business contracts with expertise in cybersecurity and data privacy.  

• Develops solutions to complex legal questions by researching unique legal issues impacting the organization.

• Minimizes legal risk to the company by developing and managing procedures for negotiating with vendors for compliance with Great Clips required contractual terms and compliance with legal requirements for privacy and data security.

• Establishes and maintains a vendor management program and company-wide contracting processes to ensure consistency, minimize legal risk, and ensure proper signing authority.

• Directs the ongoing upgrade and maintenance of the legal databases to ensure accurate, up-to-date information is available; and manages the reporting and analysis of the data to accurately reflect the status of department and company goals.

• Directs the development, education, and execution of a program and system for vendor contract maintenance to ensure that all contracts meet program parameters while keeping key terms, contract milestones, and dates such as expirations or renewals visible.

• Directs the implementation of privacy training programs such as social engineering, spear phishing, and phishing to increase employee awareness and understanding of company privacy and security policies, procedures, and legal obligations.

• Directs the implementation, education, and ongoing administration of a document management and document retention system to ensure company-wide participation and compliance with record retention policies and procedures, promote ease of access to electronic information, and reduce associated risks and costs.

• Directs the Great Clips Crisis Team, leads meetings, manages the Great Clips Critical Incident Response process, handles crisis calls, maintains emergency and critical incident resources and procedures for franchisees and salon staff to ensure that the processes by which Great Clips deals with major events that threaten to harm the company, franchisees, salon staff or the general public are up to date and available for implementation by key executive staff.

• Provides legal review and negotiation based on Great Clips established requirements for training center and Great Clips guaranteed leases to ensure that corporate objectives are met and to minimize risk to Great Clips.

• Provides legal support to the Great Clips marketing department with respect to contests and associated rules.

Key Technical Competencies:

• Knowledge of United States federal, state, and Canadian provincial laws pertaining to technology, accessibility, intellectual property, marketing and advertising and the ability to accurately apply these regulations to company policies, agreements, websites and other documents.

• Current knowledge and accreditation in federal and state privacy laws in the United States (CIPP/US) and Canada (CIPP/C) and monitoring of changes in information privacy regulations to ensure organizational adaptation and compliance.

• Current knowledge and accreditation in privacy program management (CIPM).

• Ability to comprehend complex legal materials, analyze information and recommend viable solutions.

• Ability to effectively develop and consistently apply and enforce policies and systems related to franchisees.

• Knowledge of and skill in using application software in a PC environment including Microsoft Office, Microsoft Outlook, Microsoft Word, PowerPoint and Excel.

• Ability to carefully proof all work, and use proper grammar, spelling, syntax, punctuation and sentence structure.

• Ability to plan for and direct the work of staff, develop staff to their full potential, and create an environment which encourages creativity and commitment to results.

• Ability to communicate clearly and effectively in written and verbal communications.

• Knowledge of and ability to apply policies, systems, practices and precedents used within the organization to manage employees relative to recruitment, retention, motivation, rewards, discipline, development and separation.

Desired Education and Experience:

Juris Doctor Degree and 5+ years of experience in a legal or franchise environment with increasing responsibility, Certificate in Cybersecurity and Privacy Law, International Association of Privacy Professionals (IAPP) Certified Information Privacy Professional CIPP/US designation, CIPP/Canada designation and Certified Information Privacy Manager (CIPM) designation or a combination of education and experience providing equivalent knowledge.

Supervision:

This position supervises the Senior Franchise Administration Specialist. 

This job description is intended to describe the general nature and level of work being performed by people assigned to this position.  It is not intended to be an exhaustive list of all responsibilities, activities, and skills required of the position and people in the position.