VP, Deputy General Counsel - Litigation, Employment & Compliance

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At Tapestry, being true to yourself is core to who we are. When each of us brings our individuality to our collective ambition, our creativity is unleashed. This global house of brands – Coach and Kate Spade New York – was built by unconventional entrepreneurs and unexpected solutions, so when we say we believe in dreams, we mean we believe in making them happen. We’re always on a journey to becoming our best, but you can count on this: Here, your voice is valued, your ambitions are supported, and your work is recognized.

A member of the Tapestry family, we are part of a global house of brands that has unwavering optimism and is committed to being innovative and wholly inclusive. Visit Our People page to learn more about Tapestry's commitment to equity, inclusion, and diversity.

We are seeking a Vice President, Deputy General Counsel to join the Office of the Legal Department at one of the nation's leading S&P 500 retail companies. This is a high-impact, senior-level position for a seasoned legal professional who thrives in a fast-paced, entrepreneurial environment and is ready to serve as a trusted advisor to senior leadership across the organization.

As a Deputy General Counsel, you will serve as a senior member of the legal leadership team and manage a broad portfolio spanning North America litigation and disputes, employment law and have responsibility for helping to coordinate NA and cross-border internal investigations. This role will oversee regulatory proceedings, and the enterprise ethics and compliance program. You will lead a team of attorneys and support professionals experienced in litigation, employment law, compliance, and legal operations.. You will partner directly with the CLO and senior management to protect the company, mitigate legal risk, and drive a proactive, solutions-oriented legal and compliance culture. This position is ideal for someone with in-house sensibility who is comfortable operating with a high degree of autonomy in a lean organizational structure where responsibilities span multiple functions.

Key Responsibilities

Litigation & Dispute Management

• Manage all phases of litigation and disputes — with and without outside counsel — including case strategy, risk evaluation, budgeting, discovery, witness preparation, depositions, motion practice, arbitration, trial preparation, and settlement.
• Manage and resolve pre-litigation disputes, demand letters, governmental agency and regulatory inquiries, and threatened claims.
• Assess risk, evaluate litigation exposure, and provide practical, solution-oriented counsel to executives and internal stakeholders.
• Evaluate claims and exposure and make recommendations regarding case strategy and resolution, including settlement authority within designated limits.

Employment Law & Investigations

• Advise Human Resources and business leaders on employment-related disputes, workplace investigations, employee relations issues, administrative claims, disciplinary matters, and separation-related issues in North America and, from time-to-time, work with regional office to provide legal advice on international issues.
• Coordinate and conduct cross-border investigations involving the company's international operations, suppliers, and vendors, including matters implicating anti-corruption (FCPA and local law), fraud, supply chain, and workplace misconduct; manage local counsel and forensic providers; and navigate data privacy, data transfer, labor consultation, and privilege considerations across jurisdictions.
• Establish consistent investigation protocols, escalation criteria, and root-cause and remediation processes, and report investigation outcomes to senior leadership and the Board as appropriate.
• Coordinate responses to regulatory and government agency proceedings, and state agency inquiries.

Compliance & Regulatory

• Partner closely with the CLO and senior management on all aspects of the company's compliance and regulatory framework, including governmental examinations, investigations, and ongoing regulatory readiness.
• Lead, operate, and continuously enhance the company's enterprise ethics and compliance program, including program governance, risk assessments, policies and procedures, training and communications, and reporting to the CLO and senior management.
• Oversee the company's ethics hotline program, including the framework for intake, triage, case assignment, investigation tracking, anti-retaliation safeguards, documentation, trend analysis, and periodic reporting of hotline metrics to leadership.
• Support the integration of new products and market strategies into the existing compliance structure.
• Provide legal and regulatory support cross-functionally, partnering with business teams on both strategic and day-to-day matters.

Business Operations Support

• Serve as a strategic legal partner to the company's operations leadership, including store operations, distribution and fulfillment, supply chain, logistics, facilities, and loss prevention.
• Advise on operational legal risks, including workplace safety (OSHA), wage and hour compliance, premises liability, consumer protection, product safety and recalls, and vendor and supplier matters.
• Partner with operations teams to design and implement compliant policies, procedures, and controls that support efficient, scalable operations across the store and distribution network.
• Support incident response, crisis management, and business continuity planning, and manage operational claims and disputes in coordination with Risk Management and insurers.
• Advise on operational initiatives, including pricing, workforce scheduling, automation, and technology deployments in stores and distribution centers .

Legal Operations & Team Development

• Coordinate the legal operations function, assist with setting strategy and priorities for how the legal department delivers services efficiently and at scale.
• Coordinate the department's legal technology, tools and reporting, including matter management, document retention, e-discovery and document management,
• Coordinate and evolve legal processes and ways of working, including intake and triage, e-discovery, playbooks, templates, knowledge management, and self-service resources for business partners.
• Assist with develop and tracking department metrics and reporting.
• Lead, mentor, and develop attorneys and legal professionals, including hiring, performance management, succession planning, training, and career development, and foster a collaborative, inclusive, high-performing team culture.

Legal Leadership

• Serve as a key strategic partner to the CLO
• Support Board and Audit Committee matters, as needed.
• Take ownership of projects and operate with a high degree of autonomy within a lean organizational culture.
• Handle ad hoc legal matters, research and analysis of complex issues, and directly engage with internal stakeholders on legal issues as they arise.

Qualifications

Required

• Juris Doctor (J.D.) from an accredited law school.
• Admitted and in good standing with the New York State Bar.
• Minimum of 15 years of legal experience with a primary focus on litigation, investigations, and compliance, including meaningful experience in a senior in-house leadership role.
• Significant hands-on experience across all phases of litigation and disputes, including trial preparation.
• Strong employment law experience, with an ability to advise on day-to-day employment issues when needed.
• Experience managing internal investigations, subpoenas, discovery, cross-border data issues, litigation holds, document management applications, and e-discovery tools.
• Demonstrated experience running or holding significant leadership responsibility for a corporate ethics and compliance program.
• Demonstrated experience coordinating and conducting cross-border investigations, including managing local counsel and navigating foreign data privacy and employment law constraints.
• ability to work independently, multitask, and manage complex matters with minimal supervision.
• Strong litigation judgment and the ability to act quickly to assess legal risk, business impact, and strategic options.
• Excellent drafting, analytical, communication, and negotiation skills.
• Sound judgment, discretion, and the ability to handle sensitive and confidential matters.
• Ability to translate complex legal concepts into clear, practical advice for non-legal senior stakeholders.
• Strong relationship-building skills and the ability to partner across Legal, Compliance, Risk, HR, Operations, Supply Chain, IT and other business teams.
• Proven experience leading, managing, and developing legal teams.
• Experience overseeing or building a legal operations function, including legal technology, process improvement and outside counsel management.

Preferred

• Blend of big law and/or government and in-house experience, ideally supporting multi-strategy or complex business platforms.
• Familiarity with the retail industry, including global sourcing and supply chain compliance.
• Familiarity with AI and data governance
• Experience advising store, distribution, supply chain, or other operations teams at a multi-site enterprise.
• Experience with government investigations and self-disclosure decisions (e.g., DOJ, SEC, EEOC, state attorneys general).
• Intellectual curiosity and a willingness to learn the business deeply.
• Entrepreneurial mindset — adaptable, willing to roll up your sleeves, and comfortable operating in a non-siloed environment where responsibilities span multiple functions.

In addition to the Base Pay Range, total compensation will include Annual Bonus and Equity.

Our Competencies for All Employees

Courage : Doesn’t hold back anything that needs to be said; provides current, direct, complete, and “actionable” positive and corrective feedback to others; lets people know where they stand; faces up to people problems on any person or situation (not including direct reports) quickly and directly; is not afraid to take negative action when necessary.
Creativity : Comes up with a lot of new and unique ideas; easily makes connections among previously unrelated notions; tends to be seen as original and value-added in brainstorming settings.
Customer Focus : Is dedicated to meeting the expectations and requirements of internal and external customers; gets first-hand customer information and uses it for improvements in products and services; acts with customers in mind; establishes and maintains effective relationships with customers and gains their trust and respect.
Dealing with Ambiguity : Can effectively cope with change; can shift gears comfortably; can decide and act without having the total picture; isn’t upset when things are up in the air; doesn’t have to finish things before moving on; can comfortably handle risk and uncertainty.
Drive for Results : Can be counted on to exceed goals successfully; is constantly and consistently one of the top performers; very bottom-line oriented; steadfastly pushes self and others for results.
Interpersonal Savvy : Relates well to all kinds of people, up, down, and sideways, inside and outside the organization; builds appropriate rapport; builds constructive and effective relationships; uses diplomacy and tact; can diffuse even high-tension situations comfortably.
Learning on the Fly : Learns quickly when facing new problems; a relentless and versatile learner; open to change; analyzes both successes and failures for clues to improvement; experiments and will try anything to find solutions; enjoys the challenge of unfamiliar tasks; quickly grasps the essence and the underlying structure of anything.

Our Competencies for All People Managers
Strategic Agility : Sees ahead clearly; can anticipate future consequences and trends accurately; has broad knowledge and perspective; is future oriented; can articulately paint credible pictures and visions of possibilities and likelihoods; can create competitive and breakthrough strategies and plans.
Developing Direct Reports and Others : Provides challenging and stretching tasks and assignments; holds frequent development discussions; is aware of each person's career goals; constructs compelling development plans and executes them; pushes people to accept developmental moves; will take on those who need help and further development; cooperates with the developmental system in the organization; is a people builder.
Building Effective Teams : Blends people into teams when needed; creates strong morale and spirit in their team; shares wins and successes; fosters open dialogue; lets people finish and be responsible for their work; defines success in terms of the whole team; creates a feeling of belonging in the team.

Tapestry, Inc. is an equal opportunity and affirmative action employer and we pride ourselves on hiring and developing the best people. All employment decisions (including recruitment, hiring, promotion, compensation, transfer, training, discipline and termination) are based on the applicant’s or employee’s qualifications as they relate to the requirements of the position under consideration. These decisions are made without regard to age, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, genetic characteristics, race, color, creed, religion, ethnicity, national origin, alienage, citizenship, disability, marital status, military status, pregnancy, or any other legally-recognized protected basis prohibited by applicable law.

Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA)

Tapestry, Inc. will provide applicants and employees with reasonable accommodation for disabilities or religious beliefs. If you require reasonable accommodation to complete the application process, please contact Tapestry People Services at View phone number on goinhouse.com.

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Base Pay Range

$320,000.00-$360,000.00

Here are some of the benefits that we offer: Medical insurance, Dental insurance, Vision insurance, 401 (K), Paid Paternity and Maternity leave, Commuter Benefits, Disability insurance and Tuition assistance. Please click here for a complete list of U.S Corporate Compensation & Benefits.