General Counsel

The General Counsel is responsible for overseeing all legal matters, mitigating risk, and ensuring compliance with regulatory and donor requirements across jurisdictions. This role is both strategic and hands-on, and requires the ability to navigate international legal contexts and work closely with program, strategic partnership, operations, and leadership team to unlock legally sound pathways to impact.

Strategic Legal Advisory, including Program and Grantmaking

• Provide expert legal advice to leadership, program, and operations teams across a wide range of matters, including governance, cross-border compliance, employment law, and grantmaking.

• Develop creative, solutions-oriented legal guidance that enables

programmatic goals while managing risk and safeguarding the organisation.

• Build and maintain a network of regional legal and compliance experts to support Tara's obligations to funders and regulatory bodies across jurisdictions.

• Advise on and resolve complex legal questions related to grant structures, partner engagements, and contractual or compliance risk

• Lead the internal legal function by developing systems, processes, and policies that enable effective decision-making and operational efficiency.

• Develop a deep understanding of Tara's strategic priorities and proactively identify legal tools and structures that support the mission.

• Anticipate and navigate legal and reputational risks associated with the organisation's growing presence in the ecosystem.

Operational Legal Support & External Counsel

• Provide day-to-day legal support on contracts, employment matters, data protection, and nonprofit compliance (e.g., 501(c)(3), Singapore charitable status, and other equivalents).

• Advise the People & Culture team on local and global employment issues, including Employer of Record arrangements, onboarding, policies, terminations, and documentation alignment.

• Draft, maintain, and review legal templates and legal-related policies

around HR, grants, strategic partnerships, IT, Finance, and vendor contracts, etc.

• Oversee and manage relationships with external counsel to ensure high-quality, timely support across jurisdictions and legal domains, including employment, grantmaking, regulatory compliance, and risk mitigation.

• Partner with operational teams to improve internal workflows, streamline legal documentation processes, and support staff training on core legal concepts.

Governance, Compliance, & Risk Management

• Ensure compliance with all relevant laws in all jurisdictions where Tara operates, including nonprofit law, tax-exempt status, labour, and

employment regulations, data protection, lobbying, and grantmaking

compliance.

• Provide oversight for the organisation's risk management framework,

offering strategic guidance to balance legal integrity with the organisation's risk appetite.

• Manage the organisation's insurance policies and related risk coverage to ensure adequate protection and business continuity.

Organizational Development

• Create and implement training materials and internal resources to build legal fluency and decision-making capacity across teams.

• Cultivate a culture of early legal engagement and cross-functional

collaboration, where legal is seen as a partner in innovation and risk-aware action.

• Ensure legal guidance reflects Tara's values and risk tolerance while

enabling flexibility and creativity in program design and delivery.

Leadership & Culture

• Promote a culture of excellence, service orientation, high performance, and continuous improvement

• Mentor and support team members' understanding and competence of risk & compliance activities and responsibilities

• Demonstrate Tara Values in every action

• Participates in Leadership Team activities, as needed.

• Abide by Tara's policies, procedures and practices

As and when required, other responsibilities and projects will be allocated by line management.