Legal Operations Manager

The Legal Operations Manager will be responsible for designing, building, and leading the organization’s Legal Operations function from the ground up. This role will establish the strategy, systems, and processes necessary to support the Legal Department’s effectiveness, control outside counsel spend, and deliver measurable business value across the company.

The Legal Operations Manager will partner closely with the General Counsel, Finance, and business leadership to bring structure, visibility, and financial discipline to the Legal function. The immediate priority for this role is the selection and implementation of a legal billing and matter management system that will govern how the company engages, monitors, and pays outside counsel. Focuses will include:

1. Legal billing and matter management system implementation
2. Outside counsel and vendor management
3. Legal budgeting, accruals, and spend reporting
4. Contract lifecycle management
5. Compliance, records, and legal hold administration
6. Legal department process design and technology

This role requires a strategic builder who can stand up a complete legal operations infrastructure, including billing and matter management systems, implement outside counsel guidelines, contract workflows, budget and reporting frameworks, and knowledge management resources. The individual will also establish the tools, processes, and measurement frameworks needed to ensure Legal Department initiatives deliver measurable cost savings, efficiency gains, and risk reduction.

ESSENTIAL DUTIES AND RESPONSIBILITIES include the following. Other job-related duties may be assigned. 

Billing & Matter Management System Implementation

• Lead the end-to-end selection, implementation, and ongoing administration of an e-billing and matter management system, including requirements gathering, vendor evaluation, demonstrations, contract negotiation, and company-wide rollout.
• Develop the business case, implementation budget, and project roadmap; manage the vendor relationship and internal project plan through go-live and stabilization.
• Configure the system, including matter taxonomy, timekeeper rates, budget controls, approval hierarchies, and automated invoice review rules that flag billing guideline violations before payment.
• Implement,publish, and enforce outside counsel billing guidelines covering approved rates, staffing and leverage expectations, block billing, administrative time, and reimbursable expense standards.
• Establish invoice intake, review, approval, and dispute resolution workflows that route each invoice to the appropriate internal reviewer within defined service levels.
• Integrate the billing system with Accounts Payable, the general ledger, and related financial systems to ensure accurate matter coding, accrual reporting, and timely payment.
• Migrate historical matter, vendor, and spend data into the new platform and validate data integrity prior to launch.
• Train legal staff, business partners, and outside counsel firms on system use; develop user documentation, training materials, and ongoing support resources.
• Monitor system adoption, invoice compliance rates, and data quality following launch, and continuously refine configuration, guidelines, and reporting.

Outside Counsel & Vendor Management

• Manage the outside counsel panel, including firm selection, engagement letters, conflicts intake, rate negotiations, and annual rate review cycles.
• Develop and maintain law firm performance scorecards measuring cost, cycle time, responsiveness, budget accuracy, and outcome quality.
• Negotiate alternative fee arrangements, volume discounts, and fixed-fee structures to improve cost predictability.
• Manage relationships with legal service providers including e-discovery vendors, court reporters, translation services, and legal technology suppliers.
• Conduct periodic vendor audits and competitive bidding processes to validate market rates and service levels.

Legal Budgeting & Financial Reporting

• Build and manage the Legal Department’s annual operating and outside counsel budget in partnership with the General Counsel and Finance.
• Develop matter-level budgets and track actual spend against forecast, escalating variances to the General Counsel.
• Prepare monthly and quarterly accruals, forecasts, and variance analyses in coordination with Finance and Accounting.
• Deliver spend analytics, dashboards, and executive reporting on legal cost drivers, matter volume, and department performance.
• Identify and quantify cost-savings opportunities through work reallocation, insourcing, panel consolidation, and process improvement.

Contract Lifecycle Management

• Evaluate, implement, and administer a contract lifecycle management platform aligned to the company’s contracting volume and risk profile.
• Design contract intake, review, approval, and signature workflows with clearly defined ownership and turnaround expectations.
• Build and maintain contract templates, negotiation playbooks, and a standard clause library that enable business self-service for routine agreements.
• Maintain a centralized, searchable contract repository with accurate metadata, renewal dates, and obligation tracking.
• Report on contract volume, cycle time, and process bottlenecks, and implement improvements based on the data.

Compliance, Records & Legal Hold Administration

• Administer legal hold issuance, acknowledgment tracking, and release; coordinate with Information Technology on data preservation and collection.
• Maintain the company’s record retention schedule and partner with departments on compliant retention and disposition practices.
• Support corporate entity management, including state registrations, annual filings, and maintenance of corporate records.
• Coordinate the Legal Department’s response to audits, subpoenas, insurance reporting, and regulatory inquiries.
• Maintain department policies and ensure adherence to internal controls and documentation requirements.

Process, Technology & Knowledge Management

• Design and document Legal Department workflows, intake processes, escalation paths, and service level expectations for business partners.
• Evaluate, recommend, and implement legal technology that improves efficiency, visibility, and self-service capability.
• Build knowledge management resources including precedent libraries, FAQs, and guidance materials for business teams.
• Establish the department’s metrics and reporting framework, and produce recurring reporting for the General Counsel and executive leadership.
• Lead change management, communication, and training for new legal processes, policies, and systems.

Department Operations

• Serve as the primary liaison between Legal and Finance, Information Technology, Human Resources, Procurement, and Risk Management.
• Manage department reporting cadences, leadership meeting materials, and cross-functional project coordination.
• Project management of training legal department personnel on company policies and Legal Department processes.

To perform this job successfully, an individual must be able to perform each essential duty satisfactorily as listed above as well as below:

• 6–10 years of experience in legal operations, legal project management, contract management, or law firm administration.
• Demonstrated experience implementing or administering an e-billing and matter management system (such as Legal Tracker, SimpleLegal, Onit, Brightflag, TyMetrix, or CounselLink) is required.
• Experience implementing and enforcing outside counsel billing guidelines and managing invoice review, approval, and dispute workflows.
• Experience managing legal department budgets, accruals, forecasting, and spend reporting in partnership with Finance.
• Experience implementing or administering a contract lifecycle management platform and designing contract intake and approval workflows.
• Demonstrated experience building and scaling operational processes and systems in a growing organization, and process optimization.
• Strong project management skills with proven ability to lead cross-functional system implementations from requirements through adoption.
• Advanced analytical skills with the ability to translate legal spend and matter data into actionable recommendations for leadership.
• Ability to handle confidential and privileged information with a high degree of discretion and sound judgment.
• Reasonable accommodations may be made to enable individuals with disabilities to perform the essential functions.

EDUCATION and/or EXPERIENCE

Bachelor’s degree in Business Administration, Finance, Legal Studies, or related field required. Paralegal certificate, J.D., or M.B.A. preferred. Equivalent work experience may be considered in lieu of a degree. CLOC (Corporate Legal Operations Consortium) participation, legal operations certification, PMP, or Six Sigma certification is a strong plus.

COMPUTER SKILLS

Demonstrated experience in technology management. Possess intermediate to advanced knowledge of MS Office (Word, Excel, PowerPoint, and Outlook), with advanced Excel skills required for spend analysis, budget modeling, and reporting. Experience with e-billing and matter management platforms, contract lifecycle management systems, document management systems, and business intelligence or reporting tools. Familiarity with ERP and accounts payable systems. Internet/Intranet experience.

LANGUAGE SKILLS

Ability to read and interpret documents such as legal correspondence, contracts, engagement letters, invoices, operating and maintenance instructions, and procedure manuals. Ability to write reports and detailed correspondence. Ability to speak effectively and present information to internal and external audiences, including executive leadership and outside counsel.

REASONING ABILITY

Ability to resolve problems and deal with a variety of concrete variables in situations where only limited standardization exists. Ability to interpret a variety of instructions furnished in written, verbal, diagram, or schedule form. Strong problem-solving and analytical skills.

PHYSICAL DEMANDS

The physical demands described here are representative of those that must be met by an employee to successfully perform the essential functions of this job. Reasonable accommodations may be made to enable individuals with disabilities to perform the essential functions.

While performing duties of this job, the employee is regularly required to use hands to handle or feel and talk or hear. The employee is frequently required to sit. The employee is occasionally required to lift and/or move up to 10 pounds and rarely lift and/or move up to 25 pounds. Specific vision abilities required by this job include close vision, distance vision, and the ability to adjust focus.

WORK ENVIRONMENT

The work environment characteristics described here are representative of those an employee encounters while performing the essential functions of this job. Reasonable accommodations may be made to enable individuals with disabilities to perform the essential functions.

The noise level in the work environment is usually quiet.

Key Competencies

• Systems Implementation: Proven ability to lead the selection, configuration, and rollout of legal technology platforms, including e-billing, matter management, and contract lifecycle management systems, from requirements through full adoption.
• Financial Acumen: Strong command of budgeting, accruals, forecasting, and spend analysis, with the ability to partner credibly with Finance and translate legal spend into clear business insight.
• Vendor Management: Demonstrated ability to select, negotiate with, and manage outside counsel and legal service providers, holding vendors accountable to rates, guidelines, and performance expectations.
• Process Design: Ability to assess how legal work flows through the organization and design intake, review, and approval processes that reduce cycle time while maintaining appropriate legal oversight.
• Data & Analytics: Ability to build reporting frameworks and dashboards that convert matter and spend data into recommendations leadership can act on.
• Change Management: Ability to introduce new systems and processes in a way that earns adoption from attorneys, business partners, and outside counsel.
• Stakeholder Collaboration: Ability to work closely with the General Counsel, Finance, Information Technology, and department leaders to align legal operations initiatives with business priorities.
• Discretion & Judgment: Consistently exercises sound judgment and maintains strict confidentiality when handling privileged, sensitive, and business-critical information.
• Project Management: Ability to plan, sequence, and deliver multiple concurrent initiatives on schedule and within budget while managing competing priorities.