80,000 Hours helps talented people find careers that tackle the world's most pressing problems, especially reducing risks from advanced AI. We've nearly doubled in size since mid-2025, and some of our most ambitious plans now depend on legal questions we can't yet answer quickly. That’s why we’re hiring a Head of Legal or General Counsel.
We’re not the only ones! We’re hiring alongside 12 other AI safety organisations that also need lawyers, each looking for something a bit different. This post outlines what our role would involve.
- Salary: £196,000–£245,000 (London), £170,000–£212,000 (other remote), $244,000–$304,000 (US remote) and $280,000–$349,000 (Washington, DC), plus generous benefits
- Location: London preferred, or remote in the UK. We're also open to candidates working elsewhere in Europe or on US Eastern Time. We can sponsor UK visas.
- Deadline: Sunday 1 November
The role
You'd be our first senior in-house lawyer, and the person leadership relies on to navigate complex legal considerations well. You'd own legal strategy and risk for our two UK entities, manage our legal operations specialist and decide which work goes to outside counsel.
You'd be tackling questions like these:
- How do charity law's limits on political activity apply to our work on AI policy?
- How should we handle legal risk across our videos, podcasts and written content?
- How should our products handle personal data under UK GDPR and the EU AI Act?
- Should we set up a legal presence in the US, and how should our two UK entities work together as we grow?
You'd also build out the legal function. That means creating guidance, templates and an AI-assisted first line of support so staff can handle routine questions themselves. As we grow, there's room to hire more people into your team.
About you
We're looking for a qualified lawyer with in-house experience, ideally as general counsel, head of legal or sole counsel.
Experience with English charity and company law, UK data protection or US law is a plus, and experience setting up an organisation's presence in the US would be especially valuable.
You don't need an AI policy background.
As a rough guide, people with at least five years of legal practice are more likely to be successful.
Apply
Apply by the end of Sunday 1 November using the shared application form, and select 80,000 Hours plus any other organisations you'd like to be considered by. The combined job descriptions list all 13 organisations and what each one needs, including both full-time and fractional roles, so if ours isn't quite the right fit, another might be. Each organisation reviews applications and makes its own hiring decisions.
Know a lawyer who'd be great for this, or for one of the other roles? Please send them this post!
