Director Business & Legal Affairs -Operations

WELCOME TO UTOPIA

Music is incredible. It can excite hundreds, and unite thousands. But as an industry, it has been slow, complicated, and disparate. While the tech world has moved into the future, the music industry continues to be shaped by inefficient systems of the past. At Utopia we believe there is a better way. Which is why today we are setting out to transform the entire industry; creating new revenue streams, consolidating the data and decluttering the admin. Unlocking the industry’s full potential by unifying it all in one truly holistic space. Some might call that a Utopia.

Funnily enough, so do we. Welcome to Utopia. Where music lives.

WHAT UTOPIANS DO

The open secret is that the music industry is struggling with the very basics of music accounting: What was played, when and where? Who should get paid and how much?

Utopia Music is bridging the data gap by connecting global consumption, accurate metadata, and fast payments to an industry-wide trust platform. Our goal is to unlock creative value and enable Fair Pay For Every Play to make a better world for Music. The solutions we offer do not threaten to usurp the role of industry incumbents - it is about bringing transparency in the industry and supporting efficient royalty collection for all.

THE ROLE

Being a Business & Legal Affairs Operations Director at Utopia is being part of a growing professional business & legal affairs (BA) team in the legal field, providing strategic and operational management support for the BA team whilst creating business value and supporting the rest of the Utopia Group.

The main focus of the BA team is to be a strategic business partner to Utopia and its business units. In order to achieve this objective we as a team also need to work as a business unit rather than an in-house law firm. This means we need to be structured, business-minded and strive for operational excellence.

Your work will be focused on working with the BA team in the planning and organisation of Utopia's dealings with compliance to HR matters, helping to manage the operating processes and generally ensuring the efficiency of the team’s organisation and output.

The work will be international and involve contacts with external and internal stakeholders in different countries. You will be part of a team that is highly motivated and with ambitious goals for the future. You will report to our CLO and be part of a global team.

RESPONSIBILITIES

- Being a key player in the daily operations of the BA team, ensuring we continually move away from short-term and reactive to long-term and strategic.
- Identify, create, and improve legal workflows, focusing on efficiency and scalability in order to maximise team output.
- Provide strategic and operational management support with a focus on driving and optimising performance, efficiency and BA service delivery.
- A particular focus on innovation and the useful and compliant harnessing of legal tech and automation.
- Working in collaboration with different departments within the Utopia Group on their BA related workflow and planning resources.
- Utilising quality assurance strategies to identify, develop and share best practice.
- Analysing data to identify risks and opportunities, identifying any areas for improvement and innovation and any operational issues or bottlenecks.
- Supporting, researching and implementing tools and processes to improve the operational efficiency and increase productivity.
- Manage external legal spend and follow-up on budget.
- Help create a sophisticated system of external partners and vendors.
- Future-proof competencies and ways of working.
- Advise on organisational design to make sure the team at all times provides business value.
- Support work to foster diversity, inclusion and team well-being.


REQUIREMENTS

- You have a passion for music, interest in the music industry and a love for tech.
- Approximately 5-10 years previous experience working in a similar role with proven organisational and management skills. Perhaps also using the CLOC framework (https://cloc.org/).
- Previous experience in a process-driven legal / professional services environment.
- Extensive experience in capturing, mapping and documenting business requirements.
- Significant process improvement and project management experience.
- Relevant qualification (preferably a law degree or legal studies) with particular interest in business, commercial law, data and IP.
- A creative, solution and data driven attitude to meet objectives and has the ability to influence, persuade and negotiate.
- Advanced communication skills.
- You love building relationships, having fun with colleagues and super serving business partners and customers.
- Fluent in English on a very advanced level.
- You enjoy doing business.
- Have the ability to communicate complex issues and matters with finesse and clarity.
- You are able to see the bigger picture.


WHAT WE OFFER

- Great atmosphere - we live, love & breathe music & tech!
- Working in an impact oriented team and inclusive company culture.
- An experienced team to learn from, with proven track records in multiple startups and big tech companies.
- Our flexible remote policy provides Utopians the freedom to work either from one of our inspiring offices or from home.
- We celebrate being an international and multicultural company.
- Competitive benefits; packages depend on location. You’ll be given more details on this during the interview process.
- We are only recruiting within our European locations for this position.


THE HIRING PROCESS

- You send us your CV in English.
- We invite you for an introductory video call with the Talent Acquisition team to get to know you better and share more about us.
- Interview with CLO, who this position will report to.
- Interview with a member of P&C that this position will collaborate closely with.
- Final interview with a member of the BA team.

UTOPIANS

As we want to bring transparency, trust, and clarity to the music industry we serve, we know a change comes from within. Utopia is a transparent, trust-based organization striving to have clarity in thinking and doing what we set out to do.

We execute urgently and innovate to grow faster. We ship things that make a difference today, so we can make them better tomorrow. We embrace fairness and are all accountable.

Strictly diverse and inclusive. We are an equal opportunity employer.

We celebrate our diverse backgrounds and we welcome...