General Counsel & Chief Compliance Officer (m/f/d)

AURELIUS ist ein global tätiger Investor, der sich durch einen operativen Ansatz auszeichnet. Der Fokus liegt dabei auf privaten Märkten, insbesondere den Segmenten Private Equity und Private Debt. Zu den wichtigsten Investitionsplattformen zählen AURELIUS Opportunities V, AURELIUS European Opportunities IV, AUR Portfolio III und AURELIUS Wachstumskapital. AURELIUS ist in den letzten Jahren stark, vor allem international, gewachsen und beschäftigt mehr als 400 Mitarbeiter an 10 Standorten in Europa,  Nordamerika und Asien.

Bei AURELIUS kommen unternehmerisches Know-how, fachliche Expertise und leidenschaftliches Engagement in einer offenen Unternehmenskultur zusammen. Wir kommunizieren und handeln auf Augenhöhe und sorgen dafür, dass auch der Spaß bei der Arbeit nicht zu kurz kommt.

Create impact with passion!

For an AURELIUS’ portfolio company located in southern Germany we are looking for a

General Counsel & Chief Compliance Officer (m/f/d)

The General Counsel & Chief Compliance Officer is responsible for leading the Company's Legal, Compliance and Corporate Governance function and serves as a key advisor to the Executive Management Team. The role acts as a trusted advisor to the Executive Management Team and relevant governance bodies, ensuring legally robust, commercially pragmatic and well-documented decision-making.

The role safeguards the Company’s legal and ethical integrity while enabling business speed, value creation and operational continuity. It owns the legal framework for corporate governance, contracts, compliance, data privacy coordination, legal entity matters, external counsel management and key transition topics arising from the carve-out, including TSA/rTSA dependencies, approval governance and shareholder-related matters.

Supports profitable growth, strategic transactions, market expansion and value creation initiatives by providing commercially pragmatic legal leadership and risk-based decision support.

The General Counsel is expected to build a lean, business-oriented legal function that helps the organisation operate independently, manage risk proactively and engage professionally with shareholders, customers, suppliers, regulators and internal stakeholders.

Responsibilities

1. EMT legal advisory

• Provides proactive, commercially grounded legal advice on strategic decisions, operational risks, customer/supplier matters, governance topics and owner-related issues.
• Translate complex legal matters into clear business options, recommendations and decision papers.
• Monitors emerging regulatory developments and advises the Executive Management Team on material changes affecting products, services, cyber resilience, artificial intelligence, data protection, critical infrastructure, and other regulatory requirements relevant to the Company’s business and growth strategy.

2. Standalone governance and company secretarial responsibilities

• Owns the governance framework for the standalone company, including board / shareholder documentation, executive decision records, legal entity governance and statutory filings.
• Ensures effective preparation, documentation and follow-up of management, board, shareholder and legal entity meetings.
• Maintains corporate records, registers, powers of attorney, signature authorities and governance calendars and ensures effective management of board agendas, board minutes and shareholder resolutions.

3. Carve-out, TSA/rTSA and separation governance

• Provides legal oversight for transition and separation topics, including TSA/rTSA dependencies, legal risks, contract continuity, entity readiness and approval requirements.
• Supports the organisation in reducing dependencies from the former parent company while protecting service continuity, regulatory compliance and contractual rights.
• Ensures legal risks and obligations from the carve-out are tracked, assigned and escalated to the appropriate decision level.

4. Commercial contracts and risk management

• Leads legal support for customer-, supplier-, partner- and technology-contracts.
• Ensures contract standards, escalation routes and approval processes are clear, efficient and aligned with the company’s risk appetite.
• Provides pragmatic legal advice on tenders, framework agreements, supplier issues, warranties, liabilities, guarantees, disputes and claims.

5. Compliance and ethics

• Leads the compliance framework covering anti-bribery, antitrust, conflicts of interest, SpeakUp, investigations, sanctions/export-control coordination and other key compliance areas.
• Ensures compliance training, policies and reporting are fit for a standalone business and embedded across countries and functions.
• Promotes a culture of integrity, accountability and responsible business conduct.

6. Data protection and privacy governance

• Oversees legal governance of data privacy in close cooperation with the appointed DPO.
• Ensures privacy responsibilities are clearly allocated across legal entities, systems, and vendors.
• Supports risk assessments, incident governance and employee/customer-facing privacy questions where legal input is required.

7. Litigation, disputes and external counsel

• Leads the legal response to material investigations, compliance incidents, regulatory inquiries, data breaches, litigation and crisis situations.
• Manages disputes, litigation and regulatory matters in line with business priorities and risk appetite.
• Controls external counsel use, ensuring quality, speed, cost discipline and clear matter ownership.
• Builds a preferred external counsel model with transparent scope, budgets and escalation rules.

8. Legal function leadership and operating model

• Leads and develops a lean, business-focused Legal & Compliance team.
• Builds repeatable legal processes, templates, reporting routines and knowledge management.
• Drives continuous improvement and digital enablement in legal operations where practical.
• Drives adoption of technology, automation and AI-enabled legal processes to improve responsiveness, efficiency and risk visibility.

9. Strategic Projects & Transactions

• Supports acquisitions, divestitures, restructuring initiatives, strategic partnerships and other corporate transactions.
• Leads legal due diligence, transaction documentation and post-transaction integration activities where required.

Your Profile

Professional Experience

• Minimum 10–15 years of progressive legal experience, including significant exposure to corporate governance, commercial contracts, compliance and risk management in an international industrial, technology or infrastructure-related environment.
• Proven ability to act as senior legal advisor to executive management and to operate effectively in a standalone, private-equity-owned, shareholder-driven or transformation-intensive business environment.
• Experience in building or reshaping legal and compliance frameworks, managing external counsel, supporting cross-border legal entity governance and balancing legal risk with commercial urgency.
• Experience managing compliance and data protection frameworks
• Prior exposure to TSA/separation topics, shareholder governance, regulated markets, works council-sensitive topics or post-carve-out environments is a strong advantage.
• Experience in manufacturing, industrial technology, energy infrastructure or regulated B2B environments preferred.

Intercultural Experience

• Proven leadership experience in international and cross-cultural environments, managing teams with at least 5 team members across multiple geographies
• Strong experience in navigating matrix organizations and international governance structures
• High level of cultural awareness, adaptability, and communication effectiveness at executive level

Personal attributes

• Master’s degree in law; bar admission in European jurisdictions
• Further qualification or certification in compliance or data protection is a plus
• Solid understanding of corporate governance and internal control frameworks
• Fluent in English; German language skills preferred
• High ethical standards, strategic thinking, and the ability to balance risk management with business objectives
• Experience operating in transformation-heavy environment
• Strong corporate governance and legal entity management experience
• Ability to work directly with CEO, CFO, EMT, board/shareholder representatives and external advisors
• Strong commercial judgement — able to distinguish “real risk” from “legal noise”
• High speed, pragmatic, hands-on; comfortable with imperfect information
• Strong contract, dispute, compliance and data privacy governance experience
• Ability to build legal processes from scratch or redesign legacy group processes
• Cost discipline in external counsel management
• Strong stakeholder management in a matrix, multi-country industrial environment