General Counsel

Job description

Teamshares is a tech-enabled acquiror of SMEs, intending to be a permanent home when owners retire. Part holdco, part fintech, Teamshares programmatically acquires companies with $0.5 to $5 million of EBITDA from retiring owners, integrates them with the Teamshares platform, and helps employees earn company stock. Founded in 2019, Teamshares operates subsidiaries with consolidated revenue of $490 million across over 40 industries and 30 states. We are in the early days of being a public company. Over the past several years, we have continuously adapted and strengthened our model — improving financial discipline, governance rigor, and operational systems across our network. This is a pivotal moment for our Legal team. ### The Opportunity We are seeking to hire a General Counsel – a pivotal senior hire as Teamshares navigates its next phase of growth. This individual will be the company's chief legal advisor to the board, and executive team, responsible for directing the legal function while playing an active role in shaping business strategy. This is a rare role for someone whose ambitions extend beyond legal counsel, who wants to help build a public company, influence how it grows, and leave a lasting mark on how it’s governed and led. ### What You'll Do **Public Company Compliance & Governance** - Own all SEC reporting obligations including 10-K, 10-Q, 8-K, and proxy statement preparation and review. - Lead Sarbanes-Oxley compliance, insider trading policy enforcement, Regulation FD, and earnings call and quiet period mechanics. - Manage board governance, committee charters (audit, compensation, nominating), D&O insurance, and director independence determinations. - Serve as the primary legal liaison to independent directors and board committees from day one. - Help drive design and ongoing implementation of internal controls **Oversight of Legal Function** - Iterate on the company's existing legal infrastructure (contract management systems, transactions and financing processes and documents, governance documents, compliance programs, and legal operations) and manage team members for continued success as a public company. - Continue to build scalable legal processes as Teamshares and its portfolio of subsidiaries grows. - Design and directly own processes for managing outside counsel engagement and spend - Oversee design of risk philosophy across all legal and corporate matters, including on capital financing and transaction matters **Employment & Equity Compensation** - Manage the company's equity plans, including stock options, RSUs, and 409A valuations. - Draft and negotiate executive employment agreements, severance arrangements, and equity award documentation. - Advise on employment law matters across the Teamshares portfolio. **Crisis Management & Strategic Counsel** - Serve as a calm, steady presence during shareholder demands, regulatory inquiries, or litigation, transactions, communicating clearly to the board without catastrophizing or minimizing real risk. - Provide real-time legal counsel that helps the CEO and leadership make better decisions, not just safer ones. ### Basic Qualifictions - The ideal candidate is a business partner who understands our growth trajectory and fluently speaks the language of boards, investors, and operators, and who defaults to creative problem-solving rather than reflexive caution. - 10+ years of legal experience, including meaningful time at a public company or as outside counsel to public companies in an EGC context. - Experience working across multiple industries, bringing adaptable legal judgment and pattern recognition that transcends any single sector. - Deep, hands-on fluency in SEC reporting, SOX compliance, corporate governance, and public company operations. - Demonstrated experience building public company legal functions from scratch — including systems, teams, and processes — in resource-constrained environments. - Solid grounding in equity compensation, employment law, and executive agreements. - Strong commercial instincts and a track record of advancing business goals through smart, practical legal advice. - Outstanding communication skills and executive presence; comfortable presenting to boards and engaging with independent directors. - Low ego, high output — a builder and operator who wants to roll up their sleeves. - Demonstrated ability to mentor existing junior legal talent and business stakeholders — this leader will set the tone for how legal thinking develops across the organization. - J.D. from an accredited law school. ### Additional Skills/ Preferences - Transactional experience in M&A, capital markets, or both. - Experience drafting and negotiating complex commercial agreements and financing documents. - Intellectual property portfolio management. - Comfortability with data privacy compliance including GDPR, CCPA, and any applicable state or sector-specific regulations. - Experience with broad-based employee equity programs - Familiarity with State blue sky / securities laws.