Senior Manager, Outside Counsel Management
Sep 22, 2026 San Jose
About us
TikTok is the leading destination for short-form mobile video and our mission is to inspire creativity and bring joy.
- Size: 5,001 - 10,000 employees
- Industry: Entertainment & Gaming
Responsibilities
About the Role:
We are seeking an experienced Senior Manager, Vendor & Law Firm Management to lead the strategic, commercial and operational management of TikTok Legal's relationships with outside counsel, alternative legal service providers (ALSPs) and other strategic legal vendors.
Reporting to the Global Head of Legal Operations, this role will build and lead a world-class global outside counsel and legal vendor management program. The Senior Manager will develop the frameworks, processes, data, technology-enabled workflows and commercial strategies needed to optimize external legal spend, provider performance and service delivery. This role requires a commercially savvy, analytically rigorous operator who can build trusted relationships with senior attorneys and law firm partners and turn data into better decisions and measurable results.
Key Responsibilities:
Outside Counsel Strategy & Panel Management
- Develop and manage a global Outside Counsel Management Program with Legal leadership and Practice Leads.
- Define strategies for using law firms and ALSPs, including preferred counsel programs, panel structures, and practice-area and geographic coverage.
- Establish frameworks for allocating external legal resources and advise on firm selection, relationship strategy and resource allocation.
- Manage preferred-firm and strategic-provider relationships through structured governance and executive business reviews.
- Standardize provider onboarding, engagement, evaluation and offboarding.
Commercial & Legal Spend Management
- Lead commercial management of outside counsel and strategic vendors, including rate negotiations, matter budgets, fixed fees, AFAs, volume arrangements and other pricing models.
- Analyze spend, rates, matter economics and utilization to improve cost, predictability and resource allocation.
- Strengthen budgeting, forecasting, accruals and spend visibility.
- Deliver savings, cost avoidance and greater value while protecting quality and legal outcomes.
- Develop benchmarks and market intelligence for commercial and rate negotiations.
Competitive Sourcing & RFPs
- Lead sourcing and RFPs for outside counsel and legal services with Practice Leads and Procurement.
- Develop sourcing strategies, RFP materials, evaluation criteria, pricing analyses and recommendations.
- Evaluate firms consistently across quality, economics, capabilities, technology, innovation and demonstrated value.
- Provide analysis for sourcing and resource-allocation decisions.
Provider Performance & Value Management
- Build a scalable framework to measure and improve provider performance.
- Develop scorecards, KPIs and business reviews covering quality, responsiveness, staffing, efficiency, budget performance, innovation and value.
- Gather structured feedback from attorneys and Practice Leads and convert insights into management actions.
- Lead strategic reviews with key firms and vendors.
Legal Vendor Lifecycle & Operations
- Own the provider lifecycle from sourcing and onboarding through engagement, renewal and offboarding.
- Create standardized processes, playbooks, guidelines and governance.
- Build technology-enabled workflows for intake, sourcing, onboarding, engagement, billing, performance management and offboarding.
- Partner with relevant functions to implement controls for vendor risk, information security, confidentiality, data handling and compliance.
Billing, E-Billing & Financial Controls
- Partner with Legal Finance and technology teams to strengthen billing and e-billing operations.
- Establish and maintain Outside Counsel Guidelines and billing standards with Legal leadership.
- Monitor compliance and reduce billing leakage, non-compliance and inefficient spend.
- Improve invoice workflows, accruals, forecasting and spend reporting with Finance and e-billing teams.
- Use billing and matter data to improve pricing, staffing, matter management and provider performance.
Data, Analytics & Executive Reporting
- Build a data and reporting framework for outside counsel and vendor management.
- Develop dashboards covering spend, rates, matter volumes, budgets, forecasts, savings, panel utilization and provider performance.
- Turn complex data into clear insights and recommendations for Legal leadership.
- Establish KPIs and benchmarks for decisions about external legal resources.
Qualifications
Minimum Qualifications:
- Bachelor's degree or equivalent experience required
- Significant amount of relevant experience in legal operations, outside counsel or law firm management, legal spend, legal procurement, professional services management or a related field, including within a large, complex and global corporate legal.
- Demonstrated expertise in law firm economics, legal spend management and commercial negotiations, including rates, matter budgets, AFAs and other pricing models.
- Experience managing or influencing complex networks of law firms, alternative legal service providers (ALSPs) and legal vendors
- Experience developing and implementing outside counsel programs, preferred-provider panels, RFPs, scorecards and performance-management frameworks.
- Strong analytical and technology skills, including the ability to translate complex data into actionable business recommendations and leverage e-billing, matter management, spend analytics, automation and emerging AI capabilities.
- Exceptional communication and relationship-management skills, with the ability to influence senior attorneys, law firm partners and cross-functional executives.
Preferred Qualifications:
- Advanced degree in law, business, finance or another relevant field is preferred.
- Experience designing and operationalizing end-to-end lifecycle-management processes for external legal providers, from sourcing and onboarding through performance management, renewal and offboarding.
- Experience leading or collaborating with global, distributed and cross-functional teams.
- Familiarity with vendor-risk management, information security, confidentiality, data governance and compliance requirements applicable to external legal providers.
Job Information
[For Pay Transparency] Compensation Description (annually)
The base salary range for this position in the selected city is $144000 - $270000 annually.
Compensation may vary outside of this range depending on a number of factors, including a candidate's qualifications, skills, competencies and experience, and location. Base pay is one part of the Total Package that is provided to compensate and recognize employees for their work, and this role may be eligible for additional discretionary bonuses/incentives, and restricted stock units.
Benefits may vary depending on the nature of employment and the country work location. Employees have day one access to medical, dental, and vision insurance, a 401(k) savings plan with company match, paid parental leave, short-term and long-term disability coverage, life insurance, wellbeing benefits, among others. Employees also receive 10 paid holidays per year, 10 paid sick days per year and 17 days of Paid Personal Time (prorated upon hire with increasing accruals by tenure).
The Company reserves the right to modify or change these benefits programs at any time, with or without notice.
For Los Angeles County (unincorporated) Candidates:
Qualified applicants with arrest or conviction records will be considered for employment in accordance with all federal, state, and local laws including the Los Angeles County Fair Chance Ordinance for Employers and the California Fair Chance Act. Our company believes that criminal history may have a direct, adverse and negative relationship on the following job duties, potentially resulting in the withdrawal of the conditional offer of employment:
1. Interacting and occasionally having unsupervised contact with internal/external clients and/or colleagues;
2. Appropriately handling and managing confidential information including proprietary and trade secret information and access to information technology systems; and
3. Exercising sound judgment.
About the Role:
We are seeking an experienced Senior Manager, Vendor & Law Firm Management to lead the strategic, commercial and operational management of TikTok Legal's relationships with outside counsel, alternative legal service providers (ALSPs) and other strategic legal vendors.
Reporting to the Global Head of Legal Operations, this role will build and lead a world-class global outside counsel and legal vendor management program. The Senior Manager will develop the frameworks, processes, data, technology-enabled workflows and commercial strategies needed to optimize external legal spend, provider performance and service delivery. This role requires a commercially savvy, analytically rigorous operator who can build trusted relationships with senior attorneys and law firm partners and turn data into better decisions and measurable results.
Key Responsibilities:
Outside Counsel Strategy & Panel Management
- Develop and manage a global Outside Counsel Management Program with Legal leadership and Practice Leads.
- Define strategies for using law firms and ALSPs, including preferred counsel programs, panel structures, and practice-area and geographic coverage.
- Establish frameworks for allocating external legal resources and advise on firm selection, relationship strategy and resource allocation.
- Manage preferred-firm and strategic-provider relationships through structured governance and executive business reviews.
- Standardize provider onboarding, engagement, evaluation and offboarding.
Commercial & Legal Spend Management
- Lead commercial management of outside counsel and strategic vendors, including rate negotiations, matter budgets, fixed fees, AFAs, volume arrangements and other pricing models.
- Analyze spend, rates, matter economics and utilization to improve cost, predictability and resource allocation.
- Strengthen budgeting, forecasting, accruals and spend visibility.
- Deliver savings, cost avoidance and greater value while protecting quality and legal outcomes.
- Develop benchmarks and market intelligence for commercial and rate negotiations.
Competitive Sourcing & RFPs
- Lead sourcing and RFPs for outside counsel and legal services with Practice Leads and Procurement.
- Develop sourcing strategies, RFP materials, evaluation criteria, pricing analyses and recommendations.
- Evaluate firms consistently across quality, economics, capabilities, technology, innovation and demonstrated value.
- Provide analysis for sourcing and resource-allocation decisions.
Provider Performance & Value Management
- Build a scalable framework to measure and improve provider performance.
- Develop scorecards, KPIs and business reviews covering quality, responsiveness, staffing, efficiency, budget performance, innovation and value.
- Gather structured feedback from attorneys and Practice Leads and convert insights into management actions.
- Lead strategic reviews with key firms and vendors.
Legal Vendor Lifecycle & Operations
- Own the provider lifecycle from sourcing and onboarding through engagement, renewal and offboarding.
- Create standardized processes, playbooks, guidelines and governance.
- Build technology-enabled workflows for intake, sourcing, onboarding, engagement, billing, performance management and offboarding.
- Partner with relevant functions to implement controls for vendor risk, information security, confidentiality, data handling and compliance.
Billing, E-Billing & Financial Controls
- Partner with Legal Finance and technology teams to strengthen billing and e-billing operations.
- Establish and maintain Outside Counsel Guidelines and billing standards with Legal leadership.
- Monitor compliance and reduce billing leakage, non-compliance and inefficient spend.
- Improve invoice workflows, accruals, forecasting and spend reporting with Finance and e-billing teams.
- Use billing and matter data to improve pricing, staffing, matter management and provider performance.
Data, Analytics & Executive Reporting
- Build a data and reporting framework for outside counsel and vendor management.
- Develop dashboards covering spend, rates, matter volumes, budgets, forecasts, savings, panel utilization and provider performance.
- Turn complex data into clear insights and recommendations for Legal leadership.
- Establish KPIs and benchmarks for decisions about external legal resources.
Minimum Qualifications:
- Bachelor's degree or equivalent experience required
- Significant amount of relevant experience in legal operations, outside counsel or law firm management, legal spend, legal procurement, professional services management or a related field, including within a large, complex and global corporate legal.
- Demonstrated expertise in law firm economics, legal spend management and commercial negotiations, including rates, matter budgets, AFAs and other pricing models.
- Experience managing or influencing complex networks of law firms, alternative legal service providers (ALSPs) and legal vendors
- Experience developing and implementing outside counsel programs, preferred-provider panels, RFPs, scorecards and performance-management frameworks.
- Strong analytical and technology skills, including the ability to translate complex data into actionable business recommendations and leverage e-billing, matter management, spend analytics, automation and emerging AI capabilities.
- Exceptional communication and relationship-management skills, with the ability to influence senior attorneys, law firm partners and cross-functional executives.
Preferred Qualifications:
- Advanced degree in law, business, finance or another relevant field is preferred.
- Experience designing and operationalizing end-to-end lifecycle-management processes for external legal providers, from sourcing and onboarding through performance management, renewal and offboarding.
- Experience leading or collaborating with global, distributed and cross-functional teams.
- Familiarity with vendor-risk management, information security, confidentiality, data governance and compliance requirements applicable to external legal providers.
About the Role:
We are seeking an experienced Senior Manager, Vendor & Law Firm Management to lead the strategic, commercial and operational management of TikTok Legal's relationships with outside counsel, alternative legal service providers (ALSPs) and other strategic legal vendors.
Reporting to the Global Head of Legal Operations, this role will build and lead a world-class global outside counsel and legal vendor management program. The Senior Manager will develop the frameworks, processes, data, technology-enabled workflows and commercial strategies needed to optimize external legal spend, provider performance and service delivery. This role requires a commercially savvy, analytically rigorous operator who can build trusted relationships with senior attorneys and law firm partners and turn data into better decisions and measurable results.
Key Responsibilities:
Outside Counsel Strategy & Panel Management
- Develop and manage a global Outside Counsel Management Program with Legal leadership and Practice Leads.
- Define strategies for using law firms and ALSPs, including preferred counsel programs, panel structures, and practice-area and geographic coverage.
- Establish frameworks for allocating external legal resources and advise on firm selection, relationship strategy and resource allocation.
- Manage preferred-firm and strategic-provider relationships through structured governance and executive business reviews.
- Standardize provider onboarding, engagement, evaluation and offboarding.
Commercial & Legal Spend Management
- Lead commercial management of outside counsel and strategic vendors, including rate negotiations, matter budgets, fixed fees, AFAs, volume arrangements and other pricing models.
- Analyze spend, rates, matter economics and utilization to improve cost, predictability and resource allocation.
- Strengthen budgeting, forecasting, accruals and spend visibility.
- Deliver savings, cost avoidance and greater value while protecting quality and legal outcomes.
- Develop benchmarks and market intelligence for commercial and rate negotiations.
Competitive Sourcing & RFPs
- Lead sourcing and RFPs for outside counsel and legal services with Practice Leads and Procurement.
- Develop sourcing strategies, RFP materials, evaluation criteria, pricing analyses and recommendations.
- Evaluate firms consistently across quality, economics, capabilities, technology, innovation and demonstrated value.
- Provide analysis for sourcing and resource-allocation decisions.
Provider Performance & Value Management
- Build a scalable framework to measure and improve provider performance.
- Develop scorecards, KPIs and business reviews covering quality, responsiveness, staffing, efficiency, budget performance, innovation and value.
- Gather structured feedback from attorneys and Practice Leads and convert insights into management actions.
- Lead strategic reviews with key firms and vendors.
Legal Vendor Lifecycle & Operations
- Own the provider lifecycle from sourcing and onboarding through engagement, renewal and offboarding.
- Create standardized processes, playbooks, guidelines and governance.
- Build technology-enabled workflows for intake, sourcing, onboarding, engagement, billing, performance management and offboarding.
- Partner with relevant functions to implement controls for vendor risk, information security, confidentiality, data handling and compliance.
Billing, E-Billing & Financial Controls
- Partner with Legal Finance and technology teams to strengthen billing and e-billing operations.
- Establish and maintain Outside Counsel Guidelines and billing standards with Legal leadership.
- Monitor compliance and reduce billing leakage, non-compliance and inefficient spend.
- Improve invoice workflows, accruals, forecasting and spend reporting with Finance and e-billing teams.
- Use billing and matter data to improve pricing, staffing, matter management and provider performance.
Data, Analytics & Executive Reporting
- Build a data and reporting framework for outside counsel and vendor management.
- Develop dashboards covering spend, rates, matter volumes, budgets, forecasts, savings, panel utilization and provider performance.
- Turn complex data into clear insights and recommendations for Legal leadership.
- Establish KPIs and benchmarks for decisions about external legal resources.
Qualifications
Minimum Qualifications:
- Bachelor's degree or equivalent experience required
- Significant amount of relevant experience in legal operations, outside counsel or law firm management, legal spend, legal procurement, professional services management or a related field, including within a large, complex and global corporate legal.
- Demonstrated expertise in law firm economics, legal spend management and commercial negotiations, including rates, matter budgets, AFAs and other pricing models.
- Experience managing or influencing complex networks of law firms, alternative legal service providers (ALSPs) and legal vendors
- Experience developing and implementing outside counsel programs, preferred-provider panels, RFPs, scorecards and performance-management frameworks.
- Strong analytical and technology skills, including the ability to translate complex data into actionable business recommendations and leverage e-billing, matter management, spend analytics, automation and emerging AI capabilities.
- Exceptional communication and relationship-management skills, with the ability to influence senior attorneys, law firm partners and cross-functional executives.
Preferred Qualifications:
- Advanced degree in law, business, finance or another relevant field is preferred.
- Experience designing and operationalizing end-to-end lifecycle-management processes for external legal providers, from sourcing and onboarding through performance management, renewal and offboarding.
- Experience leading or collaborating with global, distributed and cross-functional teams.
- Familiarity with vendor-risk management, information security, confidentiality, data governance and compliance requirements applicable to external legal providers.
Job Information
[For Pay Transparency] Compensation Description (annually)
The base salary range for this position in the selected city is $144000 - $270000 annually.
Compensation may vary outside of this range depending on a number of factors, including a candidate's qualifications, skills, competencies and experience, and location. Base pay is one part of the Total Package that is provided to compensate and recognize employees for their work, and this role may be eligible for additional discretionary bonuses/incentives, and restricted stock units.
Benefits may vary depending on the nature of employment and the country work location. Employees have day one access to medical, dental, and vision insurance, a 401(k) savings plan with company match, paid parental leave, short-term and long-term disability coverage, life insurance, wellbeing benefits, among others. Employees also receive 10 paid holidays per year, 10 paid sick days per year and 17 days of Paid Personal Time (prorated upon hire with increasing accruals by tenure).
The Company reserves the right to modify or change these benefits programs at any time, with or without notice.
For Los Angeles County (unincorporated) Candidates:
Qualified applicants with arrest or conviction records will be considered for employment in accordance with all federal, state, and local laws including the Los Angeles County Fair Chance Ordinance for Employers and the California Fair Chance Act. Our company believes that criminal history may have a direct, adverse and negative relationship on the following job duties, potentially resulting in the withdrawal of the conditional offer of employment:
1. Interacting and occasionally having unsupervised contact with internal/external clients and/or colleagues;
2. Appropriately handling and managing confidential information including proprietary and trade secret information and access to information technology systems; and
3. Exercising sound judgment.
Responsibilities
ResponsibilitiesAbout the Role:
We are seeking an experienced Senior Manager, Vendor & Law Firm Management to lead the strategic, commercial and operational management of TikTok Legal's relationships with outside counsel, alternative legal service providers (ALSPs) and other strategic legal vendors.
Reporting to the Global Head of Legal Operations, this role will build and lead a world-class global outside counsel and legal vendor management program. The Senior Manager will develop the frameworks, processes, data, technology-enabled workflows and commercial strategies needed to optimize external legal spend, provider performance and service delivery. This role requires a commercially savvy, analytically rigorous operator who can build trusted relationships with senior attorneys and law firm partners and turn data into better decisions and measurable results.
Key Responsibilities:
Outside Counsel Strategy & Panel Management
- Develop and manage a global Outside Counsel Management Program with Legal leadership and Practice Leads.
- Define strategies for using law firms and ALSPs, including preferred counsel programs, panel structures, and practice-area and geographic coverage.
- Establish frameworks for allocating external legal resources and advise on firm selection, relationship strategy and resource allocation.
- Manage preferred-firm and strategic-provider relationships through structured governance and executive business reviews.
- Standardize provider onboarding, engagement, evaluation and offboarding.
Commercial & Legal Spend Management
- Lead commercial management of outside counsel and strategic vendors, including rate negotiations, matter budgets, fixed fees, AFAs, volume arrangements and other pricing models.
- Analyze spend, rates, matter economics and utilization to improve cost, predictability and resource allocation.
- Strengthen budgeting, forecasting, accruals and spend visibility.
- Deliver savings, cost avoidance and greater value while protecting quality and legal outcomes.
- Develop benchmarks and market intelligence for commercial and rate negotiations.
Competitive Sourcing & RFPs
- Lead sourcing and RFPs for outside counsel and legal services with Practice Leads and Procurement.
- Develop sourcing strategies, RFP materials, evaluation criteria, pricing analyses and recommendations.
- Evaluate firms consistently across quality, economics, capabilities, technology, innovation and demonstrated value.
- Provide analysis for sourcing and resource-allocation decisions.
Provider Performance & Value Management
- Build a scalable framework to measure and improve provider performance.
- Develop scorecards, KPIs and business reviews covering quality, responsiveness, staffing, efficiency, budget performance, innovation and value.
- Gather structured feedback from attorneys and Practice Leads and convert insights into management actions.
- Lead strategic reviews with key firms and vendors.
Legal Vendor Lifecycle & Operations
- Own the provider lifecycle from sourcing and onboarding through engagement, renewal and offboarding.
- Create standardized processes, playbooks, guidelines and governance.
- Build technology-enabled workflows for intake, sourcing, onboarding, engagement, billing, performance management and offboarding.
- Partner with relevant functions to implement controls for vendor risk, information security, confidentiality, data handling and compliance.
Billing, E-Billing & Financial Controls
- Partner with Legal Finance and technology teams to strengthen billing and e-billing operations.
- Establish and maintain Outside Counsel Guidelines and billing standards with Legal leadership.
- Monitor compliance and reduce billing leakage, non-compliance and inefficient spend.
- Improve invoice workflows, accruals, forecasting and spend reporting with Finance and e-billing teams.
- Use billing and matter data to improve pricing, staffing, matter management and provider performance.
Data, Analytics & Executive Reporting
- Build a data and reporting framework for outside counsel and vendor management.
- Develop dashboards covering spend, rates, matter volumes, budgets, forecasts, savings, panel utilization and provider performance.
- Turn complex data into clear insights and recommendations for Legal leadership.
- Establish KPIs and benchmarks for decisions about external legal resources.
Qualifications
QualificationsMinimum Qualifications:
- Bachelor's degree or equivalent experience required
- Significant amount of relevant experience in legal operations, outside counsel or law firm management, legal spend, legal procurement, professional services management or a related field, including within a large, complex and global corporate legal.
- Demonstrated expertise in law firm economics, legal spend management and commercial negotiations, including rates, matter budgets, AFAs and other pricing models.
- Experience managing or influencing complex networks of law firms, alternative legal service providers (ALSPs) and legal vendors
- Experience developing and implementing outside counsel programs, preferred-provider panels, RFPs, scorecards and performance-management frameworks.
- Strong analytical and technology skills, including the ability to translate complex data into actionable business recommendations and leverage e-billing, matter management, spend analytics, automation and emerging AI capabilities.
- Exceptional communication and relationship-management skills, with the ability to influence senior attorneys, law firm partners and cross-functional executives.
Preferred Qualifications:
- Advanced degree in law, business, finance or another relevant field is preferred.
- Experience designing and operationalizing end-to-end lifecycle-management processes for external legal providers, from sourcing and onboarding through performance management, renewal and offboarding.
- Experience leading or collaborating with global, distributed and cross-functional teams.
- Familiarity with vendor-risk management, information security, confidentiality, data governance and compliance requirements applicable to external legal providers.
Additional Information
- Salary: $144,000 – $270,000
- Posted: Sep 22, 2026