Climate Friendly is looking for a strategically minded, commercially astute General Counsel to lead our Legal & Compliance Team and help us scale with confidence, integrity and purpose. This is a rare in-house leadership role that combines meaningful work (natural capital and carbon markets) with genuinely sustainable working conditions.
As General Counsel, reporting into the Chief of Finance and Operations, you will provide leadership and accountability for the legal function, including team workflow, prioritisation, service standards and quality of advice. You’ll partner closely with the Executive Leadership Team and support Board-level decision-making on complex, high-stakes matters. The work is varied and substantive, commercial contracting, regulatory compliance (including AFSL and AML/CTF), governance, complaints management, and sector-specific issues across environmental and carbon law, native title and strategic partnerships. Some of the Key responsibilities include:
- Lead, coach and develop the Legal & Compliance team to deliver high-quality, timely and well-considered legal support.
- Set clear performance expectations/KPIs, monitor delivery and build sustainable team capability.
- Translate organisational strategy into an annual Legal & Compliance plan, priorities and delivery roadmap.
- Own the team’s intake, triage, prioritisation and escalation pathways to focus effort on highest-value/highest-risk matters.
- Provide executive-level advice and decision support on material legal, governance and regulatory risks (including Board support).
- Lead the drafting and negotiation of complex commercial agreements and strategic partnerships.
- Design and maintain contract frameworks and templates to support new and emerging business areas (including nature repair and carbon markets).
- Oversee legal advice across the carbon project lifecycle, including consent/native title considerations and ACCU trading matters.
- Lead and continuously improve compliance frameworks, policies and controls, including AFSL and AML/CTF obligations.
- Manage external counsel relationships and the legal budget, ensuring value-for-money and quality outcomes.
What you will bring:
- Australian practising certificate (unrestricted).
- Significant post-qualification experience (10+ years, with a mix of private practice and in-house exposure).
- Strong commercial and contracting capability, with sound risk judgement.
- Confidence advising executives and Boards on complex, high-stakes matters.
- The ability to lead a team with clarity and purpose.
- Experience in financial services compliance and regulatory environments.
What we offer
Our goal is to be an organisation that supports wholeness, lifestyle and wellbeing whilst rewarding individual and collective performance. Our benefits include:
- Work with purpose, contributing to a productive, sustainable land sector that contributes to a zero net emissions and nature positive Australia by 2050
- A fully hybrid workplace – work to your own rhythm and balance connection and productivity
- A supportive and inclusive environment that promotes diversity
- 2 all staff events a year to connect with your friends and colleagues
- Christmas holiday – 3 days of additional leave each year
- Floating public holidays
- Gender neutral paid parental leave
- 2 days each year for training / development / study leave
- Home office setup and refresh allowance
- Company performance bonus and shared equity
About Climate Friendly
Acting to combat climate change is one of the world’s most pressing challenges. Climate Friendly was founded in 2003 as a profit-for-purpose business. Our growing team is passionate about active land management, and we are focused on finding economically viable solutions to maximise our impact on climate change.
We are one of Australia’s largest and most experienced carbon farming project developers. This includes more than 190 projects with farmers, plantation managers, agribusiness, and Indigenous groups on carbon farming projects.
For a confidential discussion about the role, please feel free to reach out to britta.zimmermann@climatefriendly.com
