Regional Counsel (North and South EMEA) (French speaker)

Zendesk; United Kingdom; Hybrid; GBP 80,000 - 100,000; Full time

Job summary

A leading customer service software company is seeking a Regional Counsel to oversee legal matters across EMEA. The ideal candidate will have extensive experience in transactional law and fluency in French and English. Responsibilities include negotiating complex agreements and collaborating across teams to ensure alignment with corporate policies. This position offers a flexible hybrid working model, combining in-office time with remote work.

Qualifications

• Extensive experience in transactional law with a focus on technology commercial agreements.
• Deep expertise in drafting and negotiating complex commercial contracts in the SaaS arena.
• Strong foundation and proven experience in data protection and privacy law (GDPR).

Responsibilities

• Provide rapid legal counsel and support for commercial negotiations.
• Partner with the GTM Management Team to ensure financial and sales alignment.
• Implement process improvements for standard form agreements and workflows.

Skills

Transactional law experience

Contract negotiation

Fluency in French

Fluency in English

Data protection law

Education

Qualified lawyer in France or England & Wales

Tools

Contract Lifecycle Management tools

Salesforce

DocuSign

Job description

Regional Counsel (North and South EMEA)-French speaker

Location: London, Dublin, Paris, Krakow, or Lisbon office

At Zendesk, we are seeking a dynamic and diligent Regional Counsel to cover Zendesk’s North and South EMEA Regions, which includes the Nordics, Benelux, Netherlands, France, Iberia, Israel, Greece, and Turkey.

What you’ll be doing:

• Provide Rapid Counsel & Lead Commercial Negotiations: Serve as a primary contact for the GTM organization in the Region, providing rapid, business‑savvy, and risk‑balanced advice on deal structures and legal issues such as privacy, AI and compliance. Negotiate, draft, and finalize a high volume of complex revenue‑generating and non‑revenue generating agreements, including SaaS contracts, partner agreements, and professional services contracts, with diverse EMEA customers. Build fluency in emerging AI regulatory landscapes and support the GTM teams by managing the contractual implications related to the deployment and use of Zendesk’s AI‑powered product features.

• Partner with the GTM Management Team to Ensure Financial and Sales Alignment: Serve as a business partner to the GTM Management Team in the Region and collaborate with internal stakeholders across the business— including Sales, Finance, Revenue Operations, and Deal Desk — by actively participating in management team meetings and attending forecast meetings as needed, to ensure commercial contracts align with corporate policies and revenue recognition standards.

• Improve Processes: Recommend and implement enhancements and upkeep for standard form agreements, playbooks, CLM workflows, and training materials to streamline the sales process and ensure compliance; partner with internal technology teams to support the use of AI‑powered tools and processes aimed at increasing efficiency in routine legal tasks.

• Be a great teammate on a fantastic team: Support company initiatives, special projects, and enablement for GTM teams and work as a key team member of the fantastic EMEA commercial legal team offering support and demonstrating flexibility across matter types and regions.

What you bring to the role

• Experience: Extensive experience in transactional law with a focus on technology commercial agreements, including prior in‑house roles at B2B SaaS or high‑growth cloud technology companies. Ability to coordinate effectively and gain trust and confidence with personnel at many different levels.

• Expertise: Deep expertise in drafting and negotiating complex commercial contracts in the SaaS arena and in tackling the contractual implications of emerging technologies and regulations, such as DORA, NIS2, the EU Data Act and the EU AI Act. Exceptional business judgment, and the resilience to thrive autonomously in a high‑velocity, fast‑scaling environment.

• Privacy: Strong foundation and proven experience in data protection and privacy law (GDPR, cross‑border transfers), including negotiating Data Processing Agreements (DPAs).

• Language Skills: Mandatory fluency (written and oral) in French and English. Other European languages are beneficial.

Additional Qualifications

• Technological Fluency: Familiarity with LegalTech and business systems (e.g., Contract Lifecycle Management (CLM) tools, Salesforce, DocuSign).

• Jurisdiction: Fully qualified lawyer in France and/or England & Wales. Qualifications from other EMEA jurisdictions considered.

Working Model

At Zendesk, we embrace a flexible hybrid model, with just one day a week in the office, giving you the perfect balance between collaboration and the freedom of remote work.

The intelligent heart of customer experience

Zendesk software was built to bring a sense of calm to the chaotic world of customer service. Today we power billions of conversations with brands you know and love.

Zendesk believes in offering our people a fulfilling and inclusive experience. Our hybrid way of working, enables us to purposefully come together in person, at one of our many Zendesk offices around the world, to connect, collaborate and learn whilst also giving our people the flexibility to work remotely for part of the week.

As part of our commitment to fairness and transparency, we inform all applicants that artificial intelligence (AI) or automated decision systems may be used to screen or evaluate applications for this position, in accordance with Company guidelines and applicable law.

Zendesk is an equal opportunity employer, and we’re proud of our ongoing efforts to foster global diversity, equity, & inclusion in the workplace. Individuals seeking employment and employees at Zendesk are considered without regard to race, color, religion, national origin, age, sex, gender, gender identity, gender expression, sexual orientation, marital status, medical condition, ancestry, disability, military or veteran status, or any other characteristic protected by applicable law. We are an AA/EEO/Veterans/Disabled employer. If you are based in the United States and would like more information about your EEO rights under the law, please click here.

Zendesk endeavors to make reasonable accommodations for applicants with disabilities and disabled veterans pursuant to applicable federal and state law. If you are an individual with a disability and require a reasonable accommodation to submit this application, complete any pre‑employment testing, or otherwise participate in the employee selection process, please send an e‑mail to [e-mail] with your specific accommodation request.