Humbly Confident Legal Counsel

About Us and Why We’re Hiring

We’re YNAB (“why-nab”), a financial education company with a money management app. Our friendly, flexible method for managing finances helps people all over the world enjoy guilt-free spending and effortless saving. For two decades, people have been using YNAB and then telling their friends what a difference it has made in their lives. Check out our community on Facebook, TikTok, or Reddit (really!), or read some of our app reviews, and you’ll see what we mean. We love building something that has a huge positive impact on people’s lives.

We like to say that we “do money differently” at YNAB, and we’re similarly opinionated about how we do business. With a quickly-growing customer base and an ever-changing landscape of laws and regulations, we’ve decided it’s time to hire our first-ever Legal Counsel to help us tackle legal and data compliance the YNAB way. You’ll balance many tensions in doing so, but the short of it is: You’re the person we’re looking for if you see legal and data compliance requirements not as a burden, but as an opportunity to build an even better company and product. 

As we’ve hinted, this role covers two distinct but related areas. The legal function will be your primary priority and focus, but you’ll also be responsible for data compliance. This will allow you to work within a broader scope to protect both YNAB’s business interests, while also creating processes that appropriately protect customers’ data as we continue to grow. 

We value collaboration here, so you won’t make these decisions in a vacuum (in fact, what’s the opposite of a vacuum?). You’ll work closely with every department at YNAB, and your guidance will be a vital help to our executive team, which has ultimate responsibility for legal decisions. All along, you’ll genuinely seek to understand each team’s processes and pain points, while also keeping the big-picture goals of the company at the forefront of every decision. You’ll carry confident opinions while seeking pragmatic solutions, and you won’t shy away from considering creative solutions to complex problems.

You’re the person we’re looking for if you’re committed to being in the day-to-day work, bold about diving into the details, and excited to roll up your sleeves and execute on any legal or data compliance job at hand—all while working closely and collaboratively with people from across the company. 

Requirements:

We have three hard requirements for this role—you must:

• Live in the United States

• Be a member in good standing of at least one U.S. state bar

• Have at least three years of experience practicing law

Beyond that, we’re open-minded. We’re looking for a leader and doer in legal and data compliance, and we value a diversity of experience and skills at YNAB. That said, we expect that you’ll be most successful in this role if you also have:

• Previous in-house legal counsel experience

• Experience working with a SaaS or technology company

• Knowledge of data privacy compliance laws & regulations

That’s a super brief intro to what you’ll be working on. But first, you need to know if you’ll even like working with us. Let’s talk a bit about life at YNAB, and then we’ll go into more detail about what we’re looking for. 

YNAB started in 2004 and we haven’t taken any outside funding—we’re established, profitable, and in this for the long haul. We have one overarching requirement when it comes to joining our team: our original Core Value Manifesto has to really click with you. If you’re nodding emphatically while reading it, you’ll probably really like it here, and we can’t wait to hear from you!

We live our Core Values every day at YNAB, and we mean it when we say we are an equal-opportunity employer. We believe that a diversity of backgrounds, abilities, beliefs, and experiences is critical to our success, and we are passionate about creating a welcoming, supportive, and collaborative environment for all employees. All are encouraged to apply as we continue to grow a smart, hard-working, and diverse team that loves working together to build something that matters.

We also work really hard, together, to make working at YNAB an amazing experience, and we’re (humbly) proud to have received many of Fortune's "great place to work" awards over the last several years, including #1 two years in a row! We have a team full of truly exceptional people—the kind you’ll be excited to work with. We’d love to introduce you to a few of them!

Who You’ll Be Working With:

You’ll be reporting to Chance, our Head of Operations. He gets to obsess about building a great company and making sure that people really love their work at YNAB. He cares deeply about YNAB and the people who make it a success. When he’s not championing the YNAB team experience, you’ll find him with his family outside in Southern Utah, usually on a hike, a mountain bike, or the lake. 

As we mentioned, you’ll be a critical help to the entire Executive and Owners team. As a few examples: Angela, our Head of Support, may want your input on our GDPR process. Perhaps Sebastian, our Head of Technology, brings you into a discussion about our cookie consent options. And Lindsey, our Head of Marketing, will want your help to make sure that we have the right liability coverage for the next YNAB Fan Fest.

In particular though, you’ll work closely with our CEO Todd. Todd started at YNAB in 2010 after a search for a budgeting solution ended up in a conversation with YNAB’s founder, Jesse. One job led to another, and since then he’s been a part of developing and scaling up Support, Product Design, and Product Management at YNAB until, in February of 2021, he became YNAB’s CEO. He lives in a small New England town with his wife and three teenagers, where he keeps life as simple as he can—eating, sleeping, sitting, feeding the birds, cutting flowers, and ultrarunning.

You’ll also work closely with Kendal, our Security Lead. She joined us a couple months ago and jumped right into all things security—she’s responsible for cybersecurity, governance & compliance, and customer protection. She lives in Cape Town, South Africa and loves long distance running, being outside and drinking very good wine. 

Truthfully, you’ll probably cross paths with—well—everyone at YNAB. We can’t even list them all, really! But we can say that we are all excited that you’ll be joining us.

How You’ll Work at YNAB

Now that you’ve met some of your potential future teammates, let’s talk more about YNAB as a company. Here’s how we operate:

Live (Almost) Anywhere You Want

We’ve always been a fully remote team, and have people all over the world. For this particular position, however, we’re only considering candidates based in the United States. Anywhere in the U.S. is fair game though. Just make sure you have a reliable internet connection. 

Work Four Days a Week

We’ve adopted a four-day work week (still 100% paid!) and rarely work more than that. There are occasions and seasons where things get busy and people put some extra time in—but then we encourage them to take some extra time off, too. We work hard and smart and we care deeply about what we do, but we also love our families and about 2,000 other things. We have perspective and, ultimately, we think it makes us—and our work—even better.

Flex Your Work Schedule

We’re fully remote, so a lot of our work is done asynchronously, but we love working together in real time when it makes sense. We try to schedule most meetings between 12-3 pm Eastern time (16:00-19:00 UTC) Monday-Thursday. Outside of your meetings, we trust you to set your own schedule by balancing your team’s needs with your own needs. You don’t need to ask for permission to take off early one afternoon to see the doctor, or be “active” on Slack if you’re working deeply on a project. We look at what you accomplish—not when or how long you're in front of a computer.

Take Vacation (Seriously)

We want you to take vacation. In fact, we have a minimum vacation policy of three weeks per year. Five weeks feels about right (plus two extra weeks for our company-wide December Break). It’s important to get plenty of downtime and to get out and do something. We’ll look forward to seeing pictures of your adventures in our #office-wall Slack channel!

Meet Your Team

Some of our best work (and bonding!) is done in person. You’ll generally have the opportunity to meet with your team once or twice a year, at a small-team work-focused meetup or at our company retreat. At the YNAB retreat, we love to catch up on spreadsheets and powerpoints in a Best Western conference room. Just kidding. (It’s actually hard to write that sentence, even knowing it’s a joke.) So far, we’ve gone to Costa Rica, a gigantic cabin in the mountains, a beach house in the Outer Banks, a ranch in Montana, Laguna Beach, Palm Springs, and most recently, Cape Cod. We work together, play together, and reinforce the bonds we’ve made as a team and company. Every time we meet up, we leave refreshed, motivated, and excited for the year ahead together.

Up Your Game

We’re serious about helping you improve your craft. It’s one of our favorite spending categories, and it’s the most important work of our managers. Think conferences, online courses and subscriptions, dedicated time away from work to learn something new… It's really up to you and your manager. But we love to see our people grow.

Other Benefits

Our team is spread all over the world—mostly in the United States, but also in the UK, Canada, Germany, Brazil, Mexico, and several other countries. Everyone is eligible for our generous paid family leave, vacation, holidays, and sick time. 

Since you’ll be in the United States, you’ll also be eligible for our health, dental, and vision insurance, where we cover 100% of the premium for you and your family. No need to check your vision, you read that right—100%. (Although if you did need to check your vision, NBD, we’ve got you covered!) We also have a Traditional and Roth 401(k) option, where YNAB matches your contributions up to six percent, and matches vest immediately. (Are you a personal finance junkie like our founder Jesse? He set up YNAB’s 401k to have the lowest fee structure possible, where all plan costs are paid by YNAB, not your retirement nest egg. The investment funds available are fantastic, passively-managed, ultra low-cost index funds. You’re not a PF junkie? Trust us, it’s awesome.) 

Competitive Compensation

At YNAB, we’re committed to equitable, market-driven, data-based compensation and we aim to offer a competitive benefits package to our team members. The starting salary for this role will be between $130,000 - $170,000 USD annually (with the top of that range reserved only for the most experienced candidates). If we decide to make you an offer, we’ll determine the most appropriate number based on what we know about your experience and competency for the role, and then we’ll make you our best offer and hope that you accept! If you join our team, you’ll also be eligible for a raise once a year and for our profit-share twice a year. (YNAB wins, you win—that kind of thing.)

A Few Final Tidbits

• Once you start, we DEMAND (in a friendly, ALL CAPS IS YELLING way) that you fill out your “Bucket List” spreadsheet with 50 items. (That’s harder than it sounds!) 

• We love to celebrate with you when you complete something on your bucket list—AND, we love using your bucket list as inspiration for your best birthday present(s) ever. 

• We want you firing on all cylinders, so we’ll set you up with a shiny new computer and replace it every three years.  

• Did we mention that YNAB makes a huge, positive difference in people’s lives? You may not think that matters much, but then a few months down the road, you’ll realize it’s made your job really, really enjoyable. Don’t underestimate this one!

If this sounds like your ideal environment, read on because now we want to talk about you, and how you’ll play a big part in changing people’s lives.

Now back to you, our new Legal Counsel...

As our Legal Counsel, you’ll work collaboratively across the company as our in-house legal and data compliance expert. Your role is not a consultant who merely informs stakeholders of risks and tradeoffs, but a teammate who works closely with them to see the project through to the end. You’ll remain connected to the broader team and company objectives, do the research to deeply understand the risks and opportunities, and bring creative solutions along with your own opinion of the best course of action for YNAB.

This is a big-picture-but-also-hands-on role, and as the first person we’re hiring into it, you’ll certainly help us shape it and determine what’s most important to focus on. That being said, we’ve outlined below what we imagine your day-to-day work might look like.

Legal

With legal as your primary focus, you’ll be a critical resource to help leadership make well-informed decisions in legal matters, clearly articulate our policies and practices, ensure they comply with regulations, and protect our business interests. You’ll immerse yourself in the YNAB context, including the value of the YNAB voice, how we treat customers, partners, and employees, and our degrees of comfort with various risks. 

What this might look like in practice:

• Policy development and review: You’ll review, create, and update internal and external legal and compliance policies and guidelines (for example: our Terms of Service, Privacy Policy, and HR-related policies), and relish the opportunity to do so in the YNAB voice.

• Legal guidance: You’ll provide legal advice across all departments, and make informed and opinionated decisions when things are open to interpretation. You’ll be risk-aware, but not completely risk-averse, and you’ll be empowered to make decisions and provide guidance to leadership that aligns with our core values and business goals. You’ll need to be scrappy and willing to wear many different legal hats on any given day.

• Collaboration and communication: You’ll be a valued resource for each team in understanding their specific legal needs and working alongside them to see things through. You’ll need to confidently speak lawyer and translate for those of us definitely-not-lawyers. 

• Intellectual property: You’ll safeguard, expand, and help defend our intellectual property.

• Protect business interests: You’ll ensure we have appropriate processes and adequate protection in place (you'll work with our Security Lead on some of that). You'll be responsible for our liability insurance coverage and renewals.

• Contracts and agreements: You’ll draft and negotiate legal agreements such as B2B sales contracts, strategic partnerships, or employment contracts. You’ll review vendor agreements and suggest edits if necessary prior to our acceptance.

• External counsel: You’ll manage our relationships with various external counsels. You’ll work hand in hand with them to solve specialized or more technical legal issues, and you’ll know when to hold the line to stay true to our values.

• Monitor evolving legal landscape: You’ll stay current on legal developments and regulatory changes, to ensure proactive compliance and mitigate risks associated with new laws and regulations.

Data Compliance

We’ve distinguished ourselves from the competition as a brand customers can trust. When it comes to our customer’s financial data, our marketing and privacy practices, or the way we iterate on our products and services, that trust is incredibly important and valuable. It really can’t be understated. We all impact that trust, but you’ll play a critical role in ensuring that we maintain—and even grow—it among our customers and team members. 

You won’t dictate compliance by fiat; instead, you’ll remain connected to the broader team and company objectives and take a pragmatic approach to developing durable solutions. You’ll effectively advocate for data protection and privacy and build internal clarity that gives us confidence that our actions are aligned with our words.

What this might look like in practice:

• Data protection and compliance: You’ll interpret data and privacy laws and regulations to determine if and when adjustments are necessary to our practices and policies to remain compliant. You’ll direct the cross-functional efforts to update processes to ensure the appropriate levels of compliance.

• Monitor evolving data privacy landscape: You’ll stay current on GDPR, CCPA, and other data privacy-related laws and regulations, to help us navigate those tensions and ensure proactive compliance. 

• Data handling awareness: You’ll maintain the mapping of how various data flow through YNAB, and review vendor DPAs with a sharp eye for data and privacy handling to ensure that we know how data is processed by the vendor. 

• DPO: You’ll serve as our Data Protection Officer, as needed. 

• Complement our data and security teams: You’ll collaborate closely with these teams, so you’ll need to become familiar with our tech stack and inner workings as it relates to data, privacy, and security.

Well, this has been a lot of words—although, we’re guessing you’re used to that!—but we’ll add just a few more in summary: You’re amazingly genuine and genuinely amazing, and you will have a profound impact on both our company and our wonderful customers. If this sounds like the kind of work that would light you up, we can’t wait to hear from you.

How to Apply

• Apply at this link by Sunday, July 28th @ 11:59pm PT. Firm. It’s a real deadline. The kind you love.

• Here’s an overview of what you’ll need to include in your application:

  • A resume. If you don’t have an updated formal resume, that’s OK. An informal overview of your work history and education is all we’re looking for.

  • A cover letter. But not your typical cover letter. You have our permission to NOT be formal, just help us get to know you. We’d love for you to tell us a bit about yourself, why you’re interested in this role at YNAB, and why you think you’d be a great fit. (Please limit this to one page at most.) 

  • Answers to four questions: (Please aim for one or two paragraphs each.)

    • 1. Imagine you’re our new Legal Counsel (yay!) and you receive a message from a teammate asking the below question. Please draft a reply as though you’re writing directly to them. (Note: This is more about how you communicate and less about setting up a factually accurate scenario.) 

      • “Hi there! We’re considering implementing a new feature in the YNAB app, and we think that we’ll need to update our Terms of Service or Privacy Policy as a result. How do we know if we’ll be required to notify our customers of the change?”

    • 2. Tell us about a time when you had to negotiate competing priorities to make a business decision. How did you approach it and how did you ultimately move it forward? 

    • 3. Tell us about a time when you were convinced you were right, but have since changed your mind. What convinced you?

    • 4. What is the most important thing you would look for when hiring someone for this role?

Four Final Notes:

• Though we know it’s customary in some areas, please do not share a headshot anywhere in your application materials.

• You can always start your application, and then click the “Save application for later” link at the bottom to—you guessed it—finish it up later. (Note: that link will have an expiration date! Check your email for more information if you choose this option.)

• Our goal is to make the recruitment and hiring process as accessible as possible. If we can help you with an accessibility need, email us at accommodations@ynab.com and indicate in the subject line that you’re applying for the Legal Counsel role. (Please note that we can only respond to messages related to accommodations.)

• Finally, please click here for an outline of what this hiring process will look like. It’s rigorous, but we also hear that it’s fun (truly!). We enjoy getting to know you throughout, and we make sure you have plenty of chances to get to know us, too. 

We’re excited to hear from you!

P.S. If you’re not interested in this position right now, but know someone who might be, we’d appreciate you passing this along!