The Vietnam Legal Lead / Head of Legal serves as the primary legal advisor for the company's Vietnam operations, ensuring compliance with both local and global regulations while enabling sustainable business growth. This role provides strategic legal guidance, manages enterprise risk, and drives governance across all operations. Acting as a trusted partner to senior leadership, the position oversees contract governance, regulatory affairs, dispute resolution, and compliance programs. It also plays a critical role in capability building, fostering a culture of integrity, and supporting strategic initiatives to safeguard the company’s reputation and operational continuity.
Key Responsibilities
- Strategic Legal Advisory: Serve as a trusted legal advisor to the Executive Committee (ExCom), providing proactive, business-aligned legal guidance on strategic and operational matters. Anticipate legal risks and regulatory shifts, shaping risk mitigation strategies that enable growth.
- Contract Governance & Commercial Enablement: Oversee the contract lifecycle management to ensure alignment with corporate policies, legal frameworks, and commercial strategy. Lead the legal structuring of complex partnerships, projects, and supply chain arrangements, ensuring legal soundness and business agility.
- Enterprise Risk & Compliance Leadership: Drive the legal compliance agenda across functions by embedding global corporate policies and local regulatory requirements into business practices. Partner with Regional Compliance teams to lead training, investigations, and ethics/whistleblower case resolutions. Lead self-audits and cross-functional risk assessments.
- Corporate Governance & Regulatory Affairs: Ensure compliance with corporate governance frameworks and statutory requirements, including entity management and board governance. Lead strategic engagement with regulatory bodies to support business expansion, licensing, and issue resolution.
- Brand & Marketing Risk Oversight: Partner with Marketing and Category teams to safeguard brand integrity by reviewing and approving all advertising, labeling, and promotional materials for compliance.
- Dispute Resolution & Legal Advisory: Lead litigation strategy, manage external counsel, and oversee legal cost efficiency. Provide expert legal opinions to support business-critical decisions and dispute resolution.
- Capability Building & Culture of Integrity: Build legal acumen across the organization by delivering strategic training on key regulatory topics (e.g., anti-bribery, competition law, governance). Foster a culture of accountability, transparency, and compliance at all levels.
- Strategic Leadership Support: Advise and support the General Manager on special legal projects and strategic initiatives. Serve as a core member of the Crisis Management Team, ensuring legal readiness in business continuity planning.
Requirements
- Education: Law degree from a top accredited law school.
- License: Must be licensed to practice law in Vietnam, holding a valid legal practitioner's certificate.
- Experience: 12+ years of legal experience within a manufacturing environment, highly preferred in the FMCG/consumer goods sector.
- Knowledge/Expertise: Deep expertise in contract law, labor/employment law, intellectual property (IP), and commercial law.
- Business Acumen: Extensive legal advisory experience working with multinational companies, local suppliers, and distributors. Excellent communication and stakeholder management skills.
