Senior Counsel, Group Benefits

Guided by our company Purpose of “Inspiring well-being for our colleagues, consumers, and communities,” we are committed to building a best-in-class Law Department.

We drive a high-performance culture across our Legal, Compliance, and Government Affairs functions, aligned to “what” we deliver, our goals and “how” we deliver, and our values and behaviors demonstrated in delivering against our goals. We do this through leveraging a series of core capabilities, which includes interpersonal effectiveness, ability to demonstrate business savvy, being a subject matter expert in your practice area, and leading people and teams where applicable.

Our colleagues, and the candidates we hire are key to the continuing success of our department.

In this role you will join a team of attorneys and staff who advise and provide legal guidance to the Guardian Group business. This business offers group dental, vision, life, disability, absence, and supplemental health products along with a growing list of innovative, wellness offerings. Specific support expertise includes counseling of internal clients, coordinating work performed by outside counsel, negotiating, and drafting contracts, providing regulatory, and ensuring compliance with Company guidelines.

The Senior Counsel, will partner closely with business area attorneys, product, marketing, distribution, analytics, and technology leaders across the company to identify insights, highlight problems and provide critical input into key decisions to execute on the Company’s strategy.

The ideal candidate is experienced and knowledgeable, someone who can operate with minimal guidance, is highly customer focused, demonstrates solid business judgment, has strong negotiation and legal skills and instinct with flexibility to meet diverse needs of various business leaders and initiatives, has strong written and verbal communication skills, is practical, a doer and has outstanding business judgment.

You will

• Provide crisp, pragmatic real time advice on business matters, to internal business clients as requested on agreement terms, regulatory or legal requirements, company policies, processes, approval requirements, and legal issues.

• Collaborate with and facilitate cross-team decision-making among the product team, legal team, operations and other various internal departments and clients.

• Review and prepare distribution agreements, commercial and client agreements, and other documents, counseling clients on related regulatory and other legal issues.

• Identify and provide counsel on a range of legal issues related to commercial product development and distribution activities of Group, including the collection, use, sharing and protection of regulated information under relevant federal and state law.

• Provide analysis and legal counsel related to the permissibility of new business initiatives as it relates to federal and state insurance matters in supporting Group products.

• Develop external contacts and participate in professional organizations that will provide benchmarks for law internally and enhance the understanding of the external environment to anticipate trends and developments in the field.

You have

• Law degree (J.D. or equivalent) and New York bar admission preferred.

• Strong record of relevant experience and progressing responsibility at a law firm, insurance carrier or other financial services firm (5 to 10 Years experience)

• Commitment to highest level of ethics, integrity, professionalism, and confidentiality.

Functional Leadership Skills & Behaviors

Interpersonal Effectiveness

• Demonstrate ability to use communications and stories to inspire, motivate and influence others on ideas.

• Communicate with conciseness, composure, and confidence in an engaging manner.

• Go beyond the expected and engage others to do more

• Proactively seek out leadership or significant project opportunities rather than wait for direction.

Business Savvy

• Take the time to learn and become well-versed in the business. Bring your professional expertise to bear for business or customer needs in a way that makes a significant difference.

• A strategic end to end view in organizing and planning work or initiatives and able to deliver exceptional results and outcomes by influencing others.

• Find ways to ask insightful questions in creating or shaping a new solution. Challenge existing approaches and enlist others in new thinking. Have experience creating a change environment and champion new projects that shape the future.

Legal Expertise

• A mastery of both written and oral communications wit