Special Offer 

Jumpstart your hiring with a $75 credit to sponsor your first job.*

Sponsored Jobs are 2.6x times faster to first hire than non-sponsored jobs.**
  • Attract the talent you’re looking for
  • Get more visibility in search results
  • Appear to more candidates longer

General Counsel Job Description: Top Duties and Qualifications

A General Counsel, or Corporate Counsel, provides legal advice and strategies to an organization’s executive team. Their main duties include reviewing and writing various internal legal contracts, negotiating and managing client and vendor contracts and ensuring legal compliance regarding employee safety and mergers and acquisitions.

General Counsel duties and responsibilities

In order to effectively maintain the company’s legal standing, a General Counsel has to fulfill a wide variety of duties and responsibilities that touch every department. The primary duty is to maintain legal compliance, but that involves many things. The major duties and responsibilities of a General Counsel include:

  • Advising executive members on new laws, existing laws and legal rights that would impact functionality of the business
  • Overseeing the legal matters of the business as a whole, including acting as the business’ legal representative
  • Maintaining knowledge of the company’s legal documents and operations
  • Crafting and reviewing legal strategy in response to any litigation
  • Keeping a record of all legal documents and proceedings for the company
  • Facilitating filings of licensing forms and other statutory requirements
  • Communicating with outside counsel
  • Legally filing for copyright of intellectual property

Hire your next General Counsel today.

Build a job description

Hire your next General Counsel today.

Build a job description
Close

General Counsel Job Description Examples

Optimize Your Interviews
Use our toolkit to optimize your interview process, improve your hiring decisions and enhance the candidate experience.
Get the Toolkit

What does a General Counsel do?

A General Counsel acts as the chief Lawyer of a company and serves on the executive team as the organization’s legal representative. They provide educated legal advice to senior management, board members and other executives on various legal matters and instruct them on how to remain compliant with current corporate laws. They’re trusted with certain legal documents and private company information and must safely store and apply this information to help them make wise legal decisions for the company.

They’ll also handle certain statutory filings, like licensing forms, and must use their advanced knowledge and skill set to advise executives on how to handle these legal issues. General Counsels may also create new entities and are in charge of properly managing the company’s intellectual properties.

General Counsel skills and qualifications

Considering the level of responsibility that General Counsels have, extensive skills and qualifications are required. Here are the most important skills and qualifications you need to list in your job description to attract applicants who can handle that kind of responsibility:

  • A General Counsel needs leadership to manage several legal experts and to direct them and executives at the company to achieve the best legal outcomes.
  • Laws are constantly changing, and a General Counsel needs to remain informed of all the latest changes on the federal, state, city and county measures that could impact the operation of the business.
  • When an entity files litigation against the business, the General Counsel needs negotiation skills to charge of the response, from formulating a strategy to going to the courthouse to argue a case.
  • A General Counsel needs expert communication skills to ensure all litigation information and instruction to staff are clear and effectively ensure the desired outcome.

General Counsel salary expectations

A General Counsel makes an average of $132,593 per year. Salary may depend on level of experience, education and the geographical location.

General Counsel salary expectations

2025-10-0131000.00161630.22396000.00YEARLY
  • Common salary: 161630.22 YEARLY
  • Typical salaries range from 31000.00 - 396000.00 YEARLY
  • Find more information on Indeed Salaries

*Indeed data – 2025-10-01

General Counsel education and training requirements

Since a General Counsel is a legal representative, there are extensive education and training requirements. A General Counsel must legally be able to practice law, so they’ll need a license from the state you’re looking to hire in. Education requirements typically involve obtaining a Master of Law degree, though some positions may call for a more advanced degree.

General Counsel experience requirements

Extensive experience is also required of a General Counsel. While some positions for small companies could be fulfilled by someone with just a few years of experience, typically, the General Counsel position requires someone who has been working with relevant legal matters for at least a decade. It’s important to note that someone who worked as a government General Counsel can excel in private industry roles.

Job description samples for similar positions

If the General Counsel job description doesn’t meet your needs, see job descriptions for related positions: 

Optimize Your Interviews
Use our toolkit to optimize your interview process, improve your hiring decisions and enhance the candidate experience.
Get the Toolkit

Three individuals are sitting at a table with a laptop, a disposable coffee cup, notebooks, and a phone visible. Two are facing each other, while the third’s back is to the camera. The setting appears to be a bright room with large windows.

Hire your next General Counsel today.

Build a job description

Frequently asked questions about General Counsels

Job Description Examples

Need help writing a job description for a specific role? Use these job description examples to create your next great job posting. Or if you’re ready to hire, post your job on Indeed.

No search results found