Associate General Counsel – Contracting Center of Excellence

Cushman & Wakefield; Chicago (IL); On-site; USD 223,000 - 262,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Health Insurance

Dental Insurance

Retirement Plan

Job summary

Cushman & Wakefield is seeking an Associate General Counsel for the Contracting Center of Excellence in the Americas. The role will establish a scalable contracting delivery model, leveraging technology, automation, and AI-enabled workflows to standardize processes, governance, and capacity planning across the region.

You will oversee complex negotiations and align legal strategy with business needs while preserving senior legal oversight. The position requires a J.D.

Qualifications

• J.D. is required and bar admission in at least one U.S. jurisdiction.
• Extensive experience leading complex commercial agreements and contracting strategy.
• Demonstrated leadership across matrixed organizations with scalable legal-service delivery.
• Experience designing or improving centralized contracting models and AI-enabled workflows.

Responsibilities

• Set and manage the Americas contracting delivery model and strategy.
• Oversee technology-enabled workflows for contracting, AI tools, and governance.
• Lead and develop the Americas CCOE team of attorneys and professionals.
• Coordinate with regional Leads in EMEA and APAC for consistency and standards.
• Provide senior escalation support on high-risk, material negotiations.

Skills

Executive communication

Stakeholder management

Leadership

Change leadership

Contracting strategy

AI-enabled workflows

Governance

Technology enablement

Education

J.D. from an accredited law school

Tools

Contracting technology platforms

Job description

Job Title

Associate General Counsel – Contracting Center of Excellence

Job Description Summary

The Associate General Counsel, Contracting Center of Excellence, Americas (CCOE), will lead the Americas contracting function within CCOE. The role will establish a scalable legal delivery model for contracting and contract-adjacent work across the Americas, with technology, automation, AI-enabled workflows, governance, standards and business alignment built into the strategy. The role requires a unique blend of expert commercial contracting experience, judgment and operational leadership — the ability to lead complex contracting strategy and material negotiations while designing the structure, governance, talent model and execution discipline that allow the broader CCOE team to deliver at scale. Efficiency is central to the mandate: data, process discipline, and technology-enabled workflows must shape how work is triaged, reviewed, routed, tracked and improved. The role will lead the disciplined transition of contracting work into CCOE, enabling Regional and Business Line Attorneys to remain focused on embedded business advice, material risk and judgment-intensive matters while ensuring service continuity, clear sequencing, capacity planning, adoption discipline and appropriate senior legal oversight. This role reports to the Chief Counsel, Americas.

Job Description

Core Responsibilities

Strategy, Operating Model & Transition

• Set the CCOE mandate, scope and technology-enabled service-delivery model for contracting and contract-adjacent work that can be centralized, standardized, made repeatable or supported through common processes, tools and escalation protocols.
• Develop the roadmap for transitioning work into CCOE, including priorities, sequencing, milestones, change-management needs, capacity planning, technology enablement and measurable outcomes.
• Establish practical workflows for intake, drafting, review, redlining, negotiation support, contract operations, service levels, reporting and escalation, designed around efficient use of available technology and AI-enabled tools.
• Define and maintain the attorney engagement model with Regional and Business Line Attorneys, including what remains within CCOE, when direct attorney involvement is required, and how escalations are raised, resolved and translated back into repeatable standards.
• Drive adoption of the CCOE model, so contracting work is routed consistently, and Regional and Business Line Attorney capacity is preserved for strategic business advice, material risk and judgment-intensive matters.
• Partner with Legal leadership and Regional and Business Line Attorney leads to align CCOE delivery with business needs, support a seamless contracting experience for business stakeholders, and translate risk positions into scalable standards and protocols.

Delivery, Technology & Team Leadership

• Lead CCOE performance across workload allocation, turnaround time, quality, escalation management, capacity planning, performance reporting, and continuous improvement.
• Oversee scalable processes for repeatable contracting and contract-adjacent activities, including renewals, amendments, contract package readiness, exhibits and attachments, workflow coordination, subject-matter expert inputs, request-for-proposal support and execution readiness.
• Set governance for templates, clause libraries, negotiation playbooks, fallback positions, approval thresholds and escalation criteria, ensuring these tools are maintained and applied consistently by the CCOE team.
• Partner with Legal Operations to embed contract-lifecycle technology, automation and AI-enabled tools into CCOE workflows and improve speed, quality, consistency, visibility and scalability.
• Lead, coach and develop the Americas CCOE team of attorneys and contracting professionals, with clear expectations for ownership, judgment, quality, business partnership and execution.
• Partner with CCOE leads in EMEA and APAC to promote consistency, share leading practices and coordinate on cross-regional contracting standards, processes and technology-enabled workflows where appropriate.

Material Contracting & Governance

• Serve as senior legal counsel for significant, complex, novel or business-critical commercial agreements requiring direct attorney involvement, and lead or support material negotiations involving risk allocation, liability, indemnification, commercial structure, precedent-setting terms and enterprise trade-offs.
• Provide senior escalation support to CCOE attorneys and contract professionals on matters outside established standards or involving material legal or business risk.
• Ensure significant contracting matters remain within the CCOE model while Regional and Business Line Attorneys are engaged for business strategy, client context, material legal judgment and appropriate escalation.
• Capture recurring issues from material negotiations and ensure they inform CCOE standards, escalation triggers, templates, team guidance and future process improvements.
• Partner across Legal leadership, Regional and Business Line Attorney leads, Legal Operations, Procurement, Risk, Privacy, Compliance and other subject-matter experts to deliver integrated contracting support and executive-level visibility into performance, risks, priorities, capacity and change-management needs.

Required Qualifications

• J.D. from an accredited law school and active bar admission in at least one U.S. jurisdiction;
• 15+ years of experience as a commercial attorney in a sophisticated in-house legal department and/or law firm, with deep experience leading complex commercial agreements and demonstrated responsibility for contracting strategy, operating-model design, process discipline, governance, technology enablement and scalable legal-service delivery;
• Demonstrated experience leading teams, major initiatives or legal-service delivery in a matrixed organization, with the ability to lead complex negotiations while thinking at the system level about how contracting should operate at enterprise scale.
• Strong commercial judgment and the ability to distinguish material legal risk from issues that can be resolved through standards, governance, repeatable processes, and business decision-making.
• Experience designing or improving contracting strategy, centralized delivery models, governance, legal operations, contract-lifecycle technology, automation, AI-enabled workflows or other technology-enabled legal delivery processes.
• Executive communication, stakeholder management and change-leadership skills, with experience operating across multiple countries, regions or business lines preferred.

What Success Looks Like

• CCOE operates with a clear mandate, scope, roadmap, and technology-enabled delivery model for contracting and contract-adjacent work.
• The Americas contracting operating model is successfully transformed and adopted, with work aligned to the appropriate delivery channel, supported by disciplined governance, capacity and change management, and delivering sustained service continuity, clear accountability and confidence from the business, Regional and Business Line Attorneys.
• Regional and Business Line Attorneys remain focused on business-critical advice, material risk and strategic legal judgment, with fewer unnecessary attorney touchpoints on repeatable contracting work.
• Significant contracts receive experienced senior legal support without reverting to a decentralized attorney contracting model.
• Technology, automation and AI-enabled workflows are embedded as integral partners in day-to-day contracting work, supported by standards, data and process discipline, and measurably improve consistency, visibility, throughput, quality and cycle time.
• Leadership has clear visibility into demand, capacity, adoption, risk, performance, and support needs.

Cushman & Wakefield also provides eligible employees with an opportunity to enroll in a variety of benefit programs, generally including health, vision, and dental insurance, flexible spending accounts, health savings accounts, retirement savings plans, life, and disability insurance programs, and paid and unpaid time away from work. In addition to a comprehensive benefits package, Cushman and Wakefield provide eligible employees with competitive pay, which may vary depending on eligibility factors such as geographic location, date of hire, total hours worked, job type, business line, and applicability of collective bargaining agreements.

The compensation that will be offered to the successful candidate will depend on factors such as whether the position is covered by a collective bargaining agreement, the geographic area in which the work will be performed, market pay rates in that area, and the candidate’s experience and qualifications.

The company will not pay less than minimum wage for this role.

The compensation for the position is: $ 222,700.00 - $262,000.00

Cushman & Wakefield is an Equal Opportunity employer to all protected groups, including protected veterans and individuals with disabilities. Discrimination of any type will not be tolerated.

In compliance with the Americans with Disabilities Act Amendments Act (ADAAA), if you have a disability and would like to request an accommodation in order to apply for a position at Cushman & Wakefield, please call the ADA line at 1-888-365-5406 or email [e-mail]. Please refer to the job title and job location when you contact us.

INCO: “Cushman & Wakefield”