Senior Counsel

Position Title: Senior Counsel

Location: Washington, D.C. (hybrid); remote considered in the US

Reports to: President

Hours per week (average): 40

Overtime Status: Exempt

About New Venture Fund

New Venture Fund provides the infrastructure to harness the power of our network of ambitious, diverse, projects and donors to support just and transformative progress, so we can go further, together. A 501(c)(3) public charity established in 2006, NVF envisions a stable, influential, and vibrant social sector, accelerating and deepening progress toward a just society. NVF specializes in project hosting, fiscal sponsorship, and grantmaking, both domestically and internationally. NVF provides funders and social change leaders with the capacity to achieve desired outcomes more quickly and hosts domestic and international projects across a range of issues, including global health and development, conservation, education, civic engagement, juvenile justice reform, and women’s empowerment.

NVF has projects across the US and in nine regions worldwide. Project activities include grantmaking, public awareness campaigns, scholarship programs, camps, special events, and advocacy. Our projects operate programmatically like small nonprofits and fiscally as programs of NVF. We use an outsourced administrative service firm to provide human resources, legal, finance, and general operations support for our hosted projects.

For more information on New Venture Fund, please visit their website. We strongly recommend reviewing our FAQ on Fiscal Sponsorship as well.

Position Summary

New Venture Fund (NVF) seeks an organized, detail-oriented and highly motivated attorney to work in-house at the nation’s largest fiscal sponsorship organization. The position will be responsible for providing timely, coordinated, and thoughtful legal advice to NVF’s leadership team on a wide variety of regulatory, compliance, and risk-management matters, grounded in applicable laws and tailored to NVF’s mission and values. The Senior Counsel also provides substantive legal advice to NVF staff working for a variety of nonprofit projects that NVF fiscally sponsors.The position will also be a central hub of coordination across outside counsel, managing workflow and engaging with specialized counsel to leverage their expertise on specific legal issues and areas of risk. The successful candidate will be able to provide responsive, practical legal information and guidance to a broad array of stakeholders, including employees, funders, advisory committees, board members, grantees, and contractors.

Essential Responsibilities

• Provide senior management with advice on a broad cross-section of tax, legislative, and regulatory issues relevant to a large charitable institution, including governance, federal income tax, grant making, lobbying, political activity, fiscal sponsorship, charitable giving, contracts, and other issues that arise.
• Provide senior management with advice on organizational strategies and their implementation, and manage the legal function of the organization.
• Stay abreast of and oversee the work of outside counsel, including employment and litigation counsel.
• Evaluate enterprise risk; conduct ongoing risk assessment and monitoring; develop and improve risk mitigation tools; and ensure appropriate insurance coverage for the organization’s activities.
• Assist and counsel NVF leadership and staff in the process of evaluating, constructing, and negotiating a broad range of service agreements, independent contractor agreements, vendor contracts, and non-disclosure agreements.
• Respond to intellectual property issues that arise from the organization’s activities.
• Provide support to leadership in developing and implementing policies and procedures through a client-focused lens.
• Oversee the legal and compliance aspects of the administrative services provided by an outside contractor, including providing general services related to compliance with state registration and reporting obligations, charitable solicitation registration, state tax exemption, foreign corporation registration, and registration of commercial co-venture agreements.

Required Education, Experience, Knowledge, Skills and Abilities

• License to practice law.
• J.D. and at least 8 years of experience with relevant legal issues.
• Excellent written and oral communication skills and a strong customer-focus orientation.
• Ability to work independently, proactively identify and prioritize needs, and to judge when it is appropriate to get assistance from outside counsel.
• Ability to work creatively and analytically on solving complex legal issues.
• Sense of humor and collegial approach to working with a team that connects to all entities served by a single supporting organization.
• Broad knowledge of tax-exempt law and practice, especially with respect to 501(c)(3) and 501(c)(4) organizations.
• Experience working with and leveraging multiple stakeholders and outside counsel highly valued.

Valued Education, Experience, Knowledge, Skills and Ability

• Knowledge of lobbying, employment, litigation, and intellectual property law is a plus.

Equity and Belonging Commitment

We envision a more equitable world, built on fair treatment, access, opportunity, and

advancement for all.

As changemakers building the most effective charitable projects, we know that advancing Equity and Belonging (E&B) is essential to solving our world's most pressing problems.

As such, we dedicate ourselves to integrating E&B into our work and our culture. As we learn more, we will do more -- ours is a continuous journey of learning, growth, and innovation.