Commercial Counsel

More than half of Americans have a poor credit score or no score at all. Since most financial institutions rely on traditional credit scoring to assess risk, that means these people can't access affordable financial products. Instead, they resort to high-interest credit cards, payday loans, and trigger overdraft fees to make ends meet — which ultimately push them into deeper cycles of debt. 

Pinwheel provides an API platform that makes it easy to connect payroll accounts like ADP and Gusto to any app. By unlocking the wealth of identity, income and employment data that sits in these systems, alongside direct access to paychecks, we can help innovators build the next generation of financial products that increase access for the underserved while improving the businesses of our partner fintechs, banks, and lenders. 

We’re a B2B company focused on unlocking the value of payroll data.  To do that, we’ll partner with companies across the board: banks, “neobanks” (non-banks doing bank-like stuff), lenders, employers, fintech apps, etc.  

Commercial Counsel will play a key role in our legal department.  You’ll be doing the most important thing we do: draft and negotiate those commercial contracts.  But every relationship is different.  We offer ~5 products, to a wide array of companies, who all want different things and to plug us into their systems in new and interesting ways.  We also have interesting partnerships across data sources that power the product, funds flow (getting money in and out of the system), and product (who else can we plug in with to help us achieve our mission).
So, this role will draft and negotiate commercial contracts, counsel internal clients on commercial and legal issues (e.g., limitation on liability, reps and warranties, pricing strategies, privacy), and be a huge contributor to our bottom line as a B2B company.  You’ll handle contract negotiations single-handedly from redlines to execution and work independently with minimal oversight.  (You won’t be left on an island; you’ll have a supportive legal department, but you’ll also need the skills to take a contract from ideation to execution, while explaining what you’re doing and recommending to the business teams.) 

You’ll work with our legal team (one other Commercial Counsel + our GC) and will get hands-on experience providing legal advice and counseling on complex commercial transactions.  You’ll interface with Product, Sales, Legal, Finance, Tech, and others.  Also, we’re a start-up, so you’ll get to work with our GC to try out other areas where you have aptitude and interest.  Do you want to learn more about issue-spotting across new product lines?  Marketing reviews?  Intellectual property?  Helping with legal guidance on HR and recruiting?  

• Drafting and negotiating a variety of commercial agreements, e.g., MSAs, supply/distribution agreements, licenses, professional services agreements and NDAs.
• Breaking down complicated concepts and explaining them to the business teams.
• Drafting in plain language.  Avoiding legalese and throat-clearing (”AFOREMENTIONED,” “HEREINAFTER,” “WARRANTS, REPRESENTS, COVENANTS, AND AGREES”).
• Interpreting and providing advice to internal clients regarding rights, obligations, restrictions, and all other contractual provisions and business terms of commercial contracts.
• Advising senior management and internal business units on legal issues and risks, and exercising strategic business judgment.
• Getting better every day.  This is a role for someone who loves working on negotiations but also wants to grow.
• Additional responsibilities may include:
  • drafting/updating form agreements;
  • privacy law compliance and product regulatory matters;
  • online terms of use & privacy policy; and
  • Working with and managing outside counsel who assist on many of the matters requiring specialized expertise included in additional responsibilities listed above.

• You’re good at contracts and you’ve done them for 5+ years.  (If you have 9 years of experience, fear not: the role could still be for you.  Just trying to set baselines.)  Bonus points for fintech or traditional finance experience.  JD, active member of a bar, in good standing.
• You can manage and analyze various aspects of complex and strategic commercial deals from inception to execution, including negotiation, drafting, and modification of deal terms.  You understand the legal nuances of B2B contracts but you write like a human being.
• This role involves influencing across departments, so knowing how to build trust and be a problem-solver (and come across as a problem-solver) is critical.
• You can manage competing priorities and time in a startup environment.  You understand that not everything can get done all at once, and you know what truly matters for sorting.
• You're curious, like a cat. Maybe your friends even call you “Whiskers.” You hear about something you don't know and you feel a need to learn it. You don't need to know everything, but you will need to know how to use your resources (regulatory guidance, your network, Slack, journals, books, Bing, law firms) to find the answer to just about any question
• You can take something complex and make it simple. You know how to pause, take a breath, and translate from lawyer-speak (e.g., a bunch of concepts and acronyms) to something the audience in front of you will grasp.
• If you listen to any of the Legal podcasts (e.g., Firmly Held, Frolic and Detour, The Attractive Nuisance, Bob Loblaw's Law Blog, Mildly Appealing), huge bonus. (None of those are real.)