Databricks · 15 hours ago
Senior Counsel, Employment
Seattle, WA
Full-time
Onsite
Senior Level, Lead/Staff
$204K/yr - $285K/yr
10+ years expDatabricks is a leading data and AI company, seeking a Senior Counsel, Employment to provide legal counseling on U.S. employment matters. The role involves advising the People Team, managing disputes, and leading global employment-related projects while ensuring compliance with relevant laws and regulations.
AnalyticsArtificial Intelligence (AI)Data IntegrationData ManagementData StorageInformation TechnologyMachine Learning
Responsibilities
Provide pragmatic, risk-balanced advice to Databricks’ People Team (including employee relations and business partners) on employment law matters for Databricks’ U.S. workforce, including: hiring and recruiting, investigations, discipline and termination, leaves of absence, disability accommodation, wage and hour, anti-discrimination, compensation and benefits (including sales compensation plans and bonus programs), non-competition and non-solicitation, protection of confidential information, contingent staffing, credentialing and background checks (including related to public sector and regulated customers), file and data subject access requests, restructuring plans, and other topics
Respond to demand letters, administrative charges, and other disputes, including investigating claims, communicating with opposing counsel, negotiating resolutions, and drafting separation and settlement agreements
Monitor new U.S. laws, regulations, and decisions affecting the substantive legal areas above and provide strategic, proactive advice to the People Team and cross-functional partners
Draft employee-facing policies, handbooks, and other resources
Prepare and lead training events on employment law-related matters
Manage outside counsel handling employment litigation and global projects, including management of budgets, driving litigation strategy, and collaborating on pleadings and other documents
Support employment-related aspects of mergers, acquisitions, strategic investments, and divestitures, including due diligence and related workforce integration efforts
Support employment-related aspects of commercial and procurement deals, including those relating to background checks and access requirements
Partner closely with privacy legal to consider employment-related impacts from business technology
Establish and maintain credibility and trust with internal clients, legal team members, and other partners
Provide sophisticated, pragmatic advice and counsel on both day-to-day and individual employee issues and strategic and organizational plans
Identify and implement process improvements that help the legal team, the People Team, and the business scale for growth, including through automated and AI solutions
Qualification
Required
JD from a top-tier accredited institution; licensed to practice law in Washington State, California, Colorado, Illinois, Virginia, New York, or Massachusetts
10+ years of employment law and litigation experience; in-house experience (including as a firm secondee) strongly preferred
Fluency in translating legal advice into practical, risk-balanced, business-oriented advice
Experience supporting business operations and partnering with the People Team/HR and other professionals across multiple locations
Experience supporting multi-jurisdictional projects
Experience providing advice directly to clients, including executive stakeholders
Strong work ethic and the highest level of integrity and business ethics
Ability to quickly and independently assess employment-related situations and develop practical options to respond to and resolve risks
Ability to build strong relationships quickly and work with all levels of the business with ease
Exceptional judgment and attention to detail, including judgment for when to escalate matters to legal leadership
Excellent written and verbal communication skills
Preferred
Tech sector experience preferred, including cloud services, data, and AI
A desire to work on complex legal issues and in new global regions as we continue to expand
Experience working with a client-service focus and a bias for action
Strong aptitude and appetite for identifying, developing, and implementing critical process improvements
Benefits
Eligibility for annual performance bonus
Equity
Comprehensive benefits and perks
Company
Databricks
Databricks is a data and AI platform that unifies data engineering, analytics, and machine learning on a lakehouse architecture.
5001-10000 employees
H1B Sponsorship
Databricks has a track record of offering H1B sponsorships. Please note that this does not
guarantee sponsorship for this specific role. Below presents additional info for your
reference. (Data Powered by US Department of Labor)
Distribution of Different Job Fields Receiving Sponsorship
Represents job field similar to this job
Trends of Total Sponsorships
2025 (385)
2024 (319)
2023 (227)
2022 (222)
2021 (166)
2020 (64)
Funding
Current Stage
Late StageTotal Funding
$25.81BKey Investors
Counterpoint GlobalFranklin TempletonAndreessen Horowitz
2025-12-16Series Unknown· $4B
2025-09-08Series Unknown· $1B
2025-01-13Debt Financing· $5.25B
Leadership Team
Ali Ghodsi
CEO and Co-founder
David Conte
Chief Financial Officer
Recent News
2026-01-22
Company data provided by crunchbase