Legal Counsel, Product

Legal Counsel, Product at GitLab

GitLab is an open-core software company that develops the most comprehensive AI-powered DevSecOps Platform, used by more than 100,000 organizations. Our mission is to enable everyone to contribute to and co-create the software that powers our world. When everyone can contribute, consumers become contributors, significantly accelerating human progress. Our platform unites teams and organizations, breaking down barriers and redefining what's possible in software development. Thanks to products like Duo Enterprise and Duo Agent Platform, customers get AI benefits at every stage of the SDLC.

The same principles built into our products are reflected in how our team works: we embrace AI as a core productivity multiplier, with all team members expected to incorporate AI into their daily workflows to drive efficiency, innovation, and impact. GitLab is where careers accelerate, innovation flourishes, and every voice is valued. Our high-performance culture is driven by our values and continuous knowledge exchange, enabling our team members to reach their full potential while collaborating with industry leaders to solve complex problems. Co-create the future with us as we build technology that transforms how the world develops software.

An Overview Of This Role

As Legal Counsel, Product, you'll be the legal partner for the GitLab teams building and shipping our products and services. You'll help product, engineering, and marketing move quickly while managing risk by giving practical guidance on product development, intellectual property, open source licensing, and regulatory questions. You'll get involved early in the development lifecycle to surface issues before they become blockers, keep agreements and playbooks current, and help GitLab stay ahead of evolving regulation so teams can ship with confidence in a globally distributed, asynchronous environment.

What You’ll Do

• Advise product and engineering teams on legal issues across the product development lifecycle, flagging risks early and recommending practical paths forward.
• Provide legal support for AI-related product development, including data retention practices, model vendor terms and acceptable use policies, opt-in flows, and customer-facing AI documentation.
• Partner with procurement legal on vendor and product-related agreements, including reviews of AI model vendor contracts, partnership terms, and procurement escalations.
• Support commercial legal with product and intellectual property (IP) guidance during customer negotiations, and help maintain field enablement materials as features evolve.
• Counsel on open source licensing, including assessing license obligations for new dependencies and advising on upstream license changes that affect how GitLab builds and distributes software.
• Draft, maintain, and improve legal templates, internal policies, and playbooks that enable teams to make consistent decisions with clear guidance.
• Review product marketing materials for accuracy, and advise on advertising, trademark, and brand questions to ensure product claims are defensible and aligned with how features work.
• Monitor changes in law and emerging legal risks, especially AI regulation, and propose process improvements that strengthen how GitLab ships and markets products responsibly.

What You’ll Bring

• JD/LLB or local law degree equivalent and admission to state bar or analogous governing body.
• Experience counseling product and engineering teams on matters across the software development lifecycle.
• Working knowledge of open source licensing concepts and how they apply to software development and distribution.
• Experience drafting, reviewing, and improving commercial agreements, templates, and internal policies, with the ability to give practical guidance that scales.
• Sufficient grounding in privacy frameworks to spot issues and partner effectively with privacy colleagues.
• Familiarity with legal issues related to AI product development and emerging AI regulation, and willingness to build expertise in new areas as regulations and product capabilities evolve.
• Ability to engage with technical and business stakeholders, communicate clearly in writing, and work effectively in a remote, globally distributed, asynchronous environment.
• Comfort using technology daily, learning new tools quickly, and improving workflows through clear documentation and process improvement.

About The Team

You'll join GitLab's Product Legal team, a small group within Legal and Corporate Affairs that partners with product, engineering, and marketing to help GitLab build, ship, and market products responsibly while managing legal risk. The team works closely with GitLab's Privacy team and supports work across product development, intellectual property, open source licensing, AI, commercial and vendor agreements, and marketing review. As an all-remote team, we collaborate asynchronously across time zones with clear communication and strong documentation to keep guidance consistent and scalable. A key focus for the team is staying ahead of fast-changing regulations while building templates, playbooks, and workflows that help teams move quickly with clear guardrails as GitLab's products and features evolve.

How GitLab Will Support You

The base salary range for this role’s listed level is currently for residents of the United States only. This range is intended to reflect the role's base salary rate in locations throughout the US. Grade level and salary ranges are determined through interviews and a review of education, experience, knowledge, skills, abilities of the applicant, equity with other team members, alignment with market data, and geographic location. The base salary range does not include any bonuses, equity, or benefits. Sales roles are also eligible for incentive pay targeted at up to 100% of the offered base salary.

United States Salary Range: $121,000—$259,200 USD

• Benefits to support your health, finances, and well-being
• Flexible Paid Time Off
• Team Member Resource Groups
• Equity Compensation & Employee Stock Purchase Plan
• Growth and Development Fund
• Parental leave
• Home office support

Please note that we welcome interest from candidates with varying levels of experience; many successful candidates do not meet every single requirement. Additionally, studies have shown that people from underrepresented groups are less likely to apply to a job unless they meet every single qualification. If you're excited about this role, please apply and allow our recruiters to assess your application.

Country Hiring Guidelines: GitLab hires new team members in countries around the world. All of our roles are remote, however some roles may carry specific location-based eligibility requirements. Our Talent Acquisition team can help answer any questions about location after starting the recruiting process.

Key skills/competency

• Legal Counsel
• Product Law
• Intellectual Property Law
• Open Source Licensing
• AI Legal & Regulation
• Regulatory Compliance
• Software Development Lifecycle
• Contract Review
• Risk Management
• SaaS Law