Employment Counsel (London, United Kingdom)
Figma is seeking an Employment Counsel to serve as the primary legal advisor for employment matters across the EMEA region. This role involves close collaboration with People and business leaders to support Figma's international workforce and scale its global employment legal function. The position is full-time and can be based in Figma's London Hub or remotely within the United Kingdom.
In this role, you will draft, revise, and update employment and benefits-related documentation and agreements as needed. You will advise senior stakeholders on complex employee relations, disciplinary, grievance, and investigation matters, recommending appropriate outcomes. Additionally, you will identify and operationalize compliance-based requirements, building scalable employment-related policies, playbooks, templates, and self-serve tools in collaboration with partner teams to help scale the legal function and the business. Supporting Figma's international growth, including expansion into new jurisdictions, workforce scaling initiatives, and evolving employment compliance requirements, will also be part of your responsibilities. Managing employment-related litigation, including strategy, discovery, drafting, and coordination with external counsel, is another key aspect of the role. You will also identify and address developing employment legal requirements and potential future legal risks to the business, collaborating with other cross-functional business teams, including legal, accounting, procurement, and communications.
The ideal candidate will be UK-qualified with over 8 years of post-qualification experience, including time at a top-tier law firm and in-house legal department practicing employment law. Significant experience providing practical, commercially focused employment law advice across EMEA is essential, covering areas such as employee relations, investigations, works councils and consultation requirements, restructurings, redundancies, dismissals, and other complex employment matters. The ability to build trusted relationships with People, Legal, and business leaders, exercise strong commercial judgment, and influence decision-making in complex situations is crucial. Experience designing and scaling employment policies, programs, processes, and documentation in a growing organization, including leveraging technology and AI-enabled tools where appropriate, is highly desirable. Exceptional communication skills, intellectual curiosity, and a collaborative approach, with a strong desire to learn, improve, and help build effective solutions, are also important.
While not required, it is an added advantage if you have significant experience with employment law in France and Germany and fluency in French or German. An interest in employment law outside of EMEA and experience with international expansion and mergers and acquisitions are also beneficial.
Figma values a culture of growth and learning, encouraging individuals to apply even if their past experience doesn't align perfectly with the job description. The company celebrates and supports diversity, believing that a team rich in diverse thoughts, experiences, and opinions allows employees, products, and the community to flourish.