Senior BIC Manager (Strategic Conflicts)

Senior BIC Manager (Strategic Conflicts)
Cooley is seeking a Senior BIC Manager (Strategic Conflicts) to join the Business Intake and Conflicts team.
About Cooley: Cooley is a global law firm with an expansive practice and more than 3,000 employees and partners worldwide. We value and celebrate diverse perspectives and strive to create a workplace where every individual can thrive. At the core of Cooley’s success is the exceptional talent and unwavering spirit of our people. We embrace individuality while fostering a ‘one-firm’ culture where collaboration and creativity thrive. Our people are the foundation of our success and the driving force behind everything we do.
Hybrid Schedule Philosophy: As part of the Cooley culture, we recognize and appreciate the value of being together, in person, to build comradery with others in the office and to be a contributing member of the Cooley office. However, we also appreciate the benefits and flexibility that come from remote working. As such, the default assumption for employees and partners is a hybrid schedule: some in-office presence and some work from home days absent certain essential in-office roles that require five (5) days/week in-office.
Position summary: The Senior BIC Manager (Strategic Conflicts) will lead the firm’s operational approach to complex, sensitive and high-profile potential engagements presenting strategic-conflicts, business, reputational, regulatory or other heightened-risk considerations. Working closely with BIC Leadership, the Strategic Conflicts Committee, the General Counsel’s Office, department and firm leadership, partners and cross-functional stakeholders, the Manager directs and coordinates each potential engagement from initial identification and diligence through executive review, decision, conflicts resolution, onboarding and implementation. The Manager brings strong project-management vision, elite organizational discipline, sound judgment and the ability to translate detailed conflicts and risk information into concise, decision-ready executive communications.
For opportunities that do not proceed, the Senior BIC Manager ensures a complete record of the analysis, rationale, approvals, unresolved issues and recommended conditions for onboarding is preserved to support consistent treatment of future attempts. The role also oversees BIC’s coordination of high-priority risk items including but not limited to the following: sanctions, export controls, Russia connections, politically exposed persons, cryptocurrency, cannabis and other red flags identified through the engagement process. The Senior BIC Manager (Strategic Conflicts) will be a dedicated resource for items of an elevated risk profile, while possessing the holistic knowledge and conflicts fluency to serve as a point of contact to firm management, lawyers, and business professionals on strategic conflicts issues and a range of other conflicts topics.
Position responsibilities:
Lead the end-to-end strategic-conflicts process for prospective clients and matters, from identification of an alert or concern through diligence, executive review, decision, conflicts resolution, engagement documentation, onboarding and implementation
Provide oversight and orchestration of departmental handling of strategic conflicts, ensuring that escalated matters are handled consistently, efficiently, and in alignment with firm policies and professional responsibility obligations
Establish a disciplined project-management framework for each potential engagement, including clear scope, owners, decision rights, milestones, dependencies, communications, escalation points and target dates
Complete and coordinate substantive diligence before escalation, including conflicts analysis, attorney outreach, matter-status validation, client and affiliate research, adverse-party review, negative-news and litigation research, prior decision history, business sensitivities, strategic-conflict implications, waiver availability and downstream impact
Prepare concise, decision-ready executive summaries that clearly identify the business opportunity, relevant facts, financials, existing-client and strategic risks, available options, waiver or guardrail considerations, outstanding dependencies, recommended path and decision required
Communicate confidently and effectively with executive leadership, partners, department leaders, the Strategic Conflicts Committee and the General Counsel’s Office, including facilitating sensitive discussions, surfacing differing perspectives and driving matters toward timely decisions
Serve as the primary escalation point and liaison among BIC Leadership, the General Counsel’s Office, and other stakeholders for strategic-conflict and heightened-risk engagement questions
Drive each viable engagement to full resolution, including obtaining required approvals, resolving conflicts, securing or coordinating waivers, defining guardrails, confirming engagement terms, implementing alerts or ethical screens and ensuring all conditions are communicated and completed before opening
When an engagement does not come to fruition, create and maintain a complete, searchable record of the analysis, stakeholders consulted, decisions, rationale, unresolved issues and conditions that should govern any future attempt to engage the client or open-related work
Maintain a reliable repository of Strategic Conflicts Committee decisions, precedent, alerts, guardrails and supporting documentation to promote consistent future decision-making and institutional knowledge
Engage in direct and close discussion of escalated conflicts topics with the General Counsel’s office and other senior stakeholders, supporting practical and well-documented resolution of sensitive issues
Serve as a primary point of contact for elevated conflicts items within the Business Intake and Conflicts team, helping triage, analyze, and route issues requiring senior review
Identify opportunities to improve conflicts workflows, escalation protocols, templates, and communication practices to support scalable and consistent delivery
Draft, review, and coordinate conflicts waivers and related communications, ensuring that proposed resolutions are clear, accurate, and appropriately tailored to the underlying risk profile
Manage BIC’s involvement in engagements presenting sanctions, export-control, Russia-connection, politically exposed person, cryptocurrency, cannabis or other regulatory, reputational, financial-crime or unusual-risk red flags identified through the intake and conflicts process
Coordinate with the appropriate legal, compliance, security, information-governance and technology stakeholders to establish approvals, access restrictions, ethical screens, technology controls, monitoring, audit trails and sustainable operational support for heightened-risk engagements
Monitor active workstreams, identify bottlenecks and preventable urgency, distinguish operational dependencies from strategic decisions and provide clear status updates to leadership and requesting attorneys
Develop and maintain decision frameworks, escalation protocols, standard communications, templates, playbooks, training and quality controls for recurring strategic-conflict and risk-management scenarios
Analyze trends, outcomes, cycle times, recurring barriers and risk categories; provide reporting and recommendations to improve governance, service delivery, data quality, consistency and executive visibility
Lead and develop assigned team members and cross-functional project teams, establish clear performance expectations, allocate work, provide coaching and ensure timely, accurate and responsive service
Maintain awareness of legal ethics, professional responsibility, sanctions, export controls and other developments affecting client and matter acceptance
All other duties as assigned or required
Skills and experience:
Required:
After orientation at Cooley LLP, proficiency in the BIC System suite, Microsoft Office suite, iManage and other firm applications
Ability to work extended and/or weekend hours, as required
7+ years of direct applicable experience (e.g., progressively responsible legal, conflicts, intake, compliance, risk-management or practicing-attorney experience, including substantial experience with complex conflicts resolution and client or matter acceptance)
2+ years of exempt/management experience in relevant roles. Work more independently, demonstrate escalating ownership and mastery of assigned area, exhibit strength in the areas below, become a resource and mentor to others and more as they progress in different roles within the department)
Experience leading complex, cross-functional projects or workstreams involving senior stakeholders, competing priorities, sensitive information and time-critical decisions.
Ability to prepare and present concise risk assessments, options and recommendations to executive leadership, partners or senior legal stakeholders
Knowledge of the American Bar Association’s Model Rules of Professional Conduct and applicable state rules of professional conduct
Strong understanding of corporate law practice, client and matter onboarding, conflicts resolution, waivers, engagement terms, ethical screens and law-firm risk-management processes
Experience conducting legal, corporate and investigative research and documenting defensible, auditable decisions
Prior experience supervising, coaching or leading professionals and managing service delivery across multiple concurre

Skills
Onboarding, Corporate Law, Documentation