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Employment Counsel

About Skillz:

Skillz is the leading mobile games platform connecting players in fair, fun, and meaningful competition.

The gaming industry is larger than movies, music, and books, with more than 2.7 billion gamers playing monthly and 10 million developers worldwide. Mobile is the fastest-growing segment of the gaming market, expected to increase from $86 billion last year to $161 billion in 2025.

As the first publicly-traded (NYSE: SKLZ) mobile esports platform, Skillz has pioneered the future of the gaming industry. The Skillz platform helps developers build multi-million dollar franchises by enabling social competition in their games. Leveraging its patented technology, Skillz hosts billions of casual esports tournaments for millions of mobile players worldwide, and distributes millions in prizes each month.

Through its philanthropic initiatives, Skillz has harnessed the power of its platform to transform the way nonprofits engage with donors, enabling anyone with a mobile device to support causes such as the American Red Cross , Susan G. Komen , American Cancer Society , and NAACP by playing in Skillz tournaments.

Skillz has also earned recognition as one of Fast Company’s Best Workplaces for Innovators , San Francisco Business Times’ Best Places to Work , Parity.org’s Best Companies for Women to Advance , Fast Company’s Most Innovative Companies , a two-time winner of CNBC’s Disruptor 50 , one of Forbes’ Next Billion-Dollar Startups , and the #1 fastest-growing company in America on the Inc. 5000.

What We’re Looking For:

The Employment Counsel will be responsible for U.S. and international labor & employment matters, and work closely with our People team. The ideal candidate is an experienced and passionate employment law expert, and a creative, nimble smart problem-solver. They have business sense, a strong work ethic, cross-functional muscle, and a growth mindset. The ideal candidate is flexible and willing to work extended hours across different time zones when necessary.

This role requires strong trust and relationship building skills to help solve challenging legal issues and shape responsive business strategies, including working cross-functionally with members of all of Skillz teams.

What You Will Do :

As a member of Skillz’s Legal Department, this attorney will serve as the primary employment attorney and contact with outside counsel. Key to this role will be to get ahead of any potential issues, assess and manage employment law risk, and offer practical, creative solutions to your business partners. Specific responsibilities will include:

• Provide day to day counseling on a broad range of employment issues, including HR practices, performance management, terminations, recruiting, hiring, compensation and benefits, wage and hour, and labor relation
• Help build and implement scalable, world-class employment policies and programs that balance legal risk with business impact
• Collaborate with the company’s HR team to handle and support compliance, employee issues, internal investigations, audits, pre-dispute conflicts, employment law claims and labor matters
• Manage all aspects of employment related litigation and discovery, including e-discovery, and coordination with company witnesses and record custodians
• Lead and collaborate with cross-functional partners on complex projects to sustain and enhance employment law compliance across multiple jurisdictions, including internationally
• Work closely with outside counsel to manage risk and ensure that internal partners receive effective, business-focused employment law support
• Support the company’s commitment to a discrimination and harassment free workplace by assisting on employment compliance projects as needed and providing training to managers and employees

Your Skillz:

• J.D. degree from an accredited law school, with membership to at least one US state bar
• 10+ years of legal experience, including in-house experience and/or technology industry experience
• Experience working in employment and executive compensation matters at both a large law firm and in-house, preferably at a high-growth tech start-up
• Expertise in federal and state employment laws and regulations (including ADA, ADEA, FMLA, CFRA, FLSA, etc.)
• Experience in handling international workforce matters is a plus
• Experience handling compliance, investigations and dispute resolution/litigation
• Demonstrated ability to build trust quickly with cross-functional partners and work effectively and collaboratively within a legal team and cross-functionally at all levels of a growing organization
• Experience advising HR teams and other cross-functional partners in building strategies to execute and operationalize advice
• Excellent communication and drafting skills and superior attention to detail
• Experience providing excellent and thorough legal services quickly in a constantly changing environment, with the ability to pivot and adjust as needed
• Demonstrated resilience and comfort working in a company experiencing rapid growth
• Ability to work efficiently and independently, with an entrepreneurial mindset and strong work ethic
• Sound business and legal judgment, with the ability to evaluate risk in light of business and practical considerations and make clear recommendations
• Excellent written and oral communication skills

Skillz embraces diversity and is proud to be an equal opportunity employer. As part of our commitment to diversifying our workforce, we do not discriminate on the basis of age, race, sex, gender, gender identity, color, religion, national origin, sexual orientation, marital status, citizenship, veteran status, or disability status, and we operate in compliance with the San Francisco Fair Chance Ordinance .