Senior Legal Counsel - Sao Palo Brazil

Overview

The Senior Legal Counsel is a senior individual contributor role that provides dedicated legal support to the Assistant General Counsel – AMERICAS and the regional Legal team. The role primarily supports the Latin America subregion (“LATAM”) within the AMERICAS region and works closely with commercial, operational, and functional stakeholders through a structured, scalable delivery model.

 

The role focuses on the execution and delivery of commercial legal support at scale, handling a high volume of matters across all of Waters business units, including Waters Advanced Diagnostics, Waters Biosciences, Waters Analytical Sciences and Waters Material Sciences. The Senior Legal Counsel plays a critical role in enabling timely, consistent, and high‑quality legal support through effective use of templates, playbooks, and defined processes.

 

Operating within an established enterprise risk framework, the role exercises sound judgment within defined parameters, escalating complex, novel, or high‑risk matters to the Assistant General Counsel – AMERICAS as appropriate. The role also partners closely with Legal Operations and global Legal colleagues to continuously improve ways of working and service delivery.

Responsibilities

Commercial Legal Execution

• Provide day‑to‑day legal support on a wide range of commercial transactions, including customer agreements, channel partner arrangements, pricing‑related terms, tenders, and related matters.
• Support commercial activities across all Waters business units aligned to the assigned region.
• Draft, review, and negotiate agreements using approved templates, playbooks, and standard positions.
• Apply practical, business‑focused judgment to support timely execution while managing legal risk within defined parameters.

Volume Management & Scalable Delivery

• Manage and execute a high volume of commercial legal work efficiently and consistently.
• Apply established triage and prioritization models to assess incoming matters and support timely routing and resolution.
• Contribute to maintaining turnaround times and service levels agreed with regional stakeholders.
• Identify opportunities to standardize, simplify, or streamline legal support to improve efficiency and reduce friction.

Collaboration with Regional Leadership

• Work closely with the Assistant General Counsel – AMERICAS and LATAM business leaders to support LATAM regional priorities and deliver aligned legal guidance.
• Understand when matters can be handled independently versus those requiring escalation due to risk, complexity, or business impact.
• Support workload allocation decisions and flex capacity based on regional demand and priorities.

Process, Tools & Legal Operations

• Leverage contract lifecycle management tools, templates, playbooks, and other Legal Operations resources to deliver consistent outcomes.
• Partner with Legal Operations to support continuous improvement initiatives, data accuracy, and reporting requirements.
• Provide feedback on recurring issues, bottlenecks, or process gaps to inform improvements to legal ways of working.

Risk Awareness & Governance

• Identify legal and compliance risks in the course of providing commercial support and escalate appropriately.
• Ensure work aligns with enterprise policies, governance standards, and approved risk positions.
• Partner with Compliance team as needed and support audits, reviews, or reporting activities as required.

Leadership Expectations – The 3 C’s

Competence

• Owns execution and delivery of a broad portfolio of commercial legal matters.
• Demonstrates strong legal judgment within defined scope and established risk appetite.
• Delivers high‑quality, outcome‑focused legal support across multiple matters simultaneously.
• Applies contextual understanding of business objectives to legal advice.

Courage

• Exercises informed judgment and escalates matters appropriately when risks exceed defined parameters.
• Identifies opportunities for improvement in processes, templates, or ways of working.
• Willingly adapts to change and supports new delivery models or tools.
• Takes ownership of work and outcomes within assigned scope.

Compassion

• Demonstrates strong situational awareness and clear, professional communication.
• Works effectively across geographies, cultures, and time zones.
• Builds trust through reliability, responsiveness, and transparency.
• Operates as a collaborative and respectful member of the global Legal team.

Qualifications

• Demonstrated experience operating at Senior Legal Counsel (or equivalent) level in a commercial or in‑house legal environment.
• Strong experience with commercial contracts and business support, preferably in regulated, technology‑driven, or multinational organizations.
• Experience working with global or regional stakeholders across geographies.
• Ability to manage high volumes of work with strong attention to detail and prioritization.
• Excellent written and verbal communication skills in English and Portuguese. Fluency in Spanish also preferred.
• Law degree required; admission to practice law in a relevant jurisdiction preferred

Company Description

Waters Corporation (NYSE:WAT) is a global leader in life sciences and diagnostics, dedicated to accelerating the benefits of pioneering science through analytical technologies, informatics, and service. With a focus on regulated, high-volume testing environments, our innovative portfolio harnesses deep scientific expertise across chemistry, physics, and biology. We collaborate with customers around the world to advance the release of effective, high-quality medicines, ensure the safety of food and water, and drive better patient outcomes by detecting diseases earlier, managing routine infections, and combating antibiotic resistance. Through a shared culture of relentless innovation, our passionate team of ~16,000 colleagues turn scientific challenges into breakthroughs that improve lives worldwide. 

 

 

Diversity and inclusion are fundamental to our core values at Waters Corporation. It benefits our employees, our products, our customers and our community. Waters complies with all applicable federal, state, and local laws. Qualified applicants are considered without regard to sex, race, color, ancestry, national origin, citizenship status, religion, age, marital status (including civil unions), military service, veteran status, pregnancy (including childbirth and related medical conditions), genetic information, sexual orientation, gender identity, legally recognized disability, domestic violence victim status, or any other characteristic protected by law. Waters is proud to be an equal opportunity workplace and is an affirmative action employer. All hiring decisions are based solely on qualifications, merit, and business needs at the time.