Head of Legal

TypeSafe AI•San Francisco, CA

5d•$250,000 - $350,000•Onsite

About The Position

TypeSafe AI is hiring its first legal employee to build and lead the company’s legal function as it grows. The Head of Legal will work directly with the founders and across engineering, product, and go-to-market teams, supporting product launches and the company’s work with customers, partners, and vendors while helping the business make thoughtful decisions about risk. The role is grounded in commercial work, product counseling, and privacy, and also owns the broader legal agenda—handling matters directly when appropriate and engaging specialists when needed. This is a hands-on role with substantial judgment and ownership. The Head of Legal will negotiate agreements, advise technical teams on data-handling questions, and determine which legal processes the company should build. The role calls for practical, clear recommendations that help the team move forward quickly. The position is fully in person at TypeSafe’s San Francisco office near Embarcadero station. The company describes its culture as centered on craftsmanship, thoughtful collaboration, kindness, and meaningful work, and offers room to establish how legal supports the technology and business.

Requirements

At least 10–15 years of relevant legal experience, including meaningful in-house experience at a growing technology company.
Strong legal training and a track record of applying it effectively inside a business.
Substantial commercial contracting experience.
Ability to counsel independently on product and privacy matters, with good judgment about the limits of one's expertise.
Experience helping a company scale its legal operations and building processes suited to the company’s stage.
Curiosity about AI and willingness to learn how the technology works, how customers use it, and where legal questions arise.
Ability to make practical decisions under uncertainty, distinguish material risks from manageable ones, and consider operational and commercial solutions alongside contractual protections.
Enjoy doing the work directly, respond quickly, and follow through in a fast-moving environment.
Clear communication skills and ability to build productive relationships with technical teams, customers, executives, investors, and outside counsel.
Ability to prioritize limited resources and explain what to build, buy, delegate, or leave for later.
Admission to practice in a U.S. jurisdiction and eligibility to practice as in-house counsel in California.

Nice To Haves

Experience at a leading law firm.

Responsibilities

Lead customer and partner negotiations, including enterprise agreements, API distribution and reseller arrangements, data processing agreements, and vendor contracts.
Build contract templates and negotiation playbooks that support company growth and protect key interests.
Advise technical teams on product design, data use and retention, international processing, and security commitments.
Translate legal requirements into decisions and policies that teams can implement.
Identify laws, regulatory developments, and industry practices that may affect the company’s products and business, and develop informed positions on how to respond.
Establish contract intake, approval, signing, and management processes.
Develop guidance and tools that enable teams to handle routine legal matters independently, using automation and AI where useful.
Own how employment, corporate, governance, intellectual property, and other legal matters are handled, and engage specialists when needed.
Select and manage outside counsel, set priorities and budgets, and determine what to handle internally.
Assess where legal tooling, a contracts manager, additional counsel, or other support would have the greatest impact as demand grows.
Build trust across the company, get involved early, help resolve difficult questions, and provide clear recommendations that account for legal exposure, commercial stakes, and practical alternatives.
Prioritize limited resources and determine what legal support to build, buy, delegate, or defer.