Legal Operations Specialist

The role

The Legal Operations Specialist serves as a project manager facilitating attorney transitions including lateral arrivals, secondments, and departures. The role involves coordinating with various stakeholders to drive transitions to completion on schedule using process roadmaps.

What you will do

• Serve as the central point of coordination for assigned attorney transitions.
• Plan and direct transitions by adapting process roadmaps and managing timelines.
• Liaise with stakeholders including Recruiting, HR, Conflicts, and Finance to resolve dependencies.
• Carry a primary transition type and provide coverage for other transition types.
• Exercise independent judgment and escalate sensitive or high-risk matters.
• Evaluate processes and recommend improvements to playbooks and roadmaps.
• Maintain accurate records across trackers, dashboards, and NBI systems.
• Coordinate data transfers in coordination with Information Governance and Information Services.
• Manage operational setup for incoming laterals including NBI and conflicts clearance.
• Facilitate the full secondment lifecycle and manage partner departures and retirements.

Required qualifications

• 3 to 5 years of experience in legal operations, law firm administration, project management, or a comparable professional services environment.
• Demonstrated record of coordinating multi-party projects from initiation through completion.
• Strong project management and organizational skills.
• Sound independent judgment.
• Ability to communicate clearly and professionally, both orally and in writing.
• Discretion and care in handling confidential and sensitive information.
• Willingness to cross-train across transition types.

Nice to have

• Familiarity with conflicts and new business intake systems (e.g., Intapp)
• Familiarity with document management platforms (e.g., iManage)
• Direct experience with lateral integration, secondments, or attorney departures
• Experience working across business services functions within a law firm

Benefits

• health care
• retirement benefits
• paid days off, including sick time, and vacation time
• parental leave
• basic life insurance
• Flexible Spending Accounts
• discretionary, performance-based bonuses

About the company

Gibson Dunn is a leading global law firm, advising clients on significant transactions and disputes.