Senior Director, Legal Affairs
Job Description:
At Warner Music Group, we’re a global collective of music makers and music lovers, tech innovators and inspired entrepreneurs, game-changing creatives and passionate team members. Here, we turn dreams into stardom and audiences into fans. We are guided by three core values that underpin everything we do across all our diverse businesses:
- Curiosity: We do our best work when we’re immersing ourselves in culture and breaking through barriers. Curiosity is the driving force behind creativity and ingenuity. It fuels innovation, and innovation is the key to our future.
- Collaboration: Making music and bringing it to the world is all about the power of originality amplified by teamwork. A great idea, like a great song, travels globally. We ignite passions and build connections across our diverse community of artists, songwriters, partners, and fans.
- Commitment: We pursue excellence for our team and our talent. Everything in music starts with a leap into the unknown, and we’re committed to keeping the faith, acting with integrity, and delivering on our promises.
WMG is home to a wide range of artists, musicians, and songwriters that fuel our success. That is why we are committed to creating a work environment that actively values, appreciates, and respects everyone. We encourage applications from people with a wide variety of backgrounds and experiences.
Consider a career at WMG and get the best of both worlds – an innovative global music company that retains the creative spirit of a nimble independent.
A little bit about our team:
Warner Music’s Center of Excellence for Shared Services, opened in 2017, is home to the financial, legal and administrative functions that provide critical support and best-in-class services to our US Recorded Music and Publishing businesses. The Nashville center embodies the innovative and creative spirit that stems from the company’s deep history in nurturing entrepreneurial thinking and artist-focused innovation, enabling our employees to develop a wide range of skills through cross-functional collaboration and development opportunities.
The Legal Shared Services Department is responsible for enforcing WMG’s rights in the recorded music catalog repertoire controlled by its US record labels, assisting with litigations involving WMG’s recorded music catalog rights in conjunction with WMG’s corporate litigation in-house counsel, fielding inquiries and resolving pre-litigation claims from third parties, researching WMG’s recorded music catalog rights for various business units, filing applications to register copyrights in and to WMG’s recorded music repertoire, and managing WMG’s relationships with the labor unions with which WMG’s US record labels have collective bargaining agreements.
Members of the Legal Shared Services Department work closely with employees in the Business Affairs, Finance, Production, Operations, New Media, and Marketing departments of each label client to fulfill the above-referenced responsibilities for the recordings those labels release.
Your role:
- Manage attorneys responsible for providing centralized legal support to WMG's US-based record labels.
- Find creative solutions to complex and atypical issues, with a focus on the management and resolution of incoming legal claims.
Here you’ll get to:
- Manage the team that fields, researches, and resolves incoming catalog legal inquiries and claims from recording artists, producers, and other third parties, and their representatives, including accounting claims, copyright claims, sample claims, reversion-of-rights claims, and other claims
- Independently research and resolve the aforementioned inquiries and claims where they are complex or sensitive in nature
- Communicate the relevant details of the aforementioned incoming inquiries and claims to the relevant internal clients and secure the approval of such clients over the resolution of such matters
- Manage all claim-related legal documents (e.g., indemnification letters, tolling agreements, settlement agreements, etc.)
- Work with the audit team to resolve catalog audits, including advising on legal aspects of audit claims and reviewing and approving responses to auditors
- Work alongside outside counsel and WMG's corporate litigation counsel to assist with the management of active catalog litigations and related issues
- Manage all NDAs for the catalog Business & Legal Affairs team
- Supervise the letter of direction/payee change process for complex and Estate-related requests, including reviewing and approving those handled by the Rights Administration team
About you:
- A Juris Doctor degree from an ABA-accredited, US law school, and a license to practice law in Tennessee
- 5+ years of relevant experience in law firms or in-house legal departments working on music and entertainment matters, reviewing and drafting various agreements and memoranda
- Strong leadership skills with the ability to mentor and develop staff and peers
- Problem solver, with the ability to find timely and creative solutions to unique issues and initiatives
- Expert at prioritization, with the ability to manage a high volume of issues and assignments at any given time and prioritize them effectively and appropriately, meeting deadlines consistently while working under pressure
- Excellent verbal and written communication skills, including demonstrable experience clearly and concisely communicating the relevant details of complex legal matters to senior managers and/or clients
- Proven analytical, mathematical, and organizational skills
We’d love it if you also had:
- Experience working in-house at a record label or similar music industry organization, working on catalog legal issues
- Experience managing and/or supervising direct reports
About us:
As the home to 10K Projects, Asylum, Atlantic Music Group, East West, FFRR, Fueled by Ramen, Nonesuch, Parlophone, Rhino, Roadrunner, Sire, Warner Records, Warner Classics, and several other of the world’s premier recording labels, Warner Music Group champions emerging artists and global superstars alike. And our renowned publishing company, Warner Chappell Music, represents genre-spanning songwriters and producers through a catalog of more than one million copyrights worldwide. Warner Music Group is also home to ADA, which supports the independent community, as well as artist services division WMX. In addition, WMG counts film and television storytelling powerhouse Warner Music Entertainment among its many brands.
Together, we are Warner Music Group: Independent Minds. Major Sound.
Love this job and want to apply?
Click the “Apply” link at the top of the page, or apply directly with your LinkedIn. Applying with LinkedIn will import all of the information you put in your profile, but will still allow you to upload a resume and cover letter.
Don’t be discouraged if you don’t hear from us right away. We’re taking our time to review all resumes, and to find the best people for WMG.
Thanks for your interest in working for WMG. We love it here, and think you will, too.
This position requires a minimum of four days per week in the office. We value in-office collaboration and believe it's essential for talent development and fostering strong working relationships.
WMG is committed to inclusion and diversity in all aspects of our business. We are proud to be an equal opportunity workplace and will evaluate qualified applicants without regard to race, religious creed, color, age, sex, sexual orientation, gender, gender identity, gender expression, national origin, ancestry, marital status, medical condition as defined by state law (genetic characteristics or cancer), physical or mental disability, military service or veteran status, pregnancy, childbirth and related medical conditions, genetic information or any other characteristic protected by applicable federal, state or local law.
