Corporate · First legal officer
The first in-house lawyer is not a scaled-down listed-company GC. We retain for the builder who can still do the contracts.
We run that search retained. Of 38 GC and CLO placements since 2017, the first-GC subset is the seat where copying a listed job description fails most often.
A first general counsel is the person who takes standing legal work off a panel of firms and puts it inside the company — commercial contracts, the board pack, employment, privacy, and the first regulatory filing the CEO cannot sign alone. The hire is due when the company has outgrown ad hoc outside counsel, usually at Series B to C, a first regulated product, board formation, or a US or EU expansion. It is not the same seat as a fractional general counsel, and it is not a junior version of the officer at a $5 billion issuer.
Sartori & Partners has completed 230+ in-house and corporate placements since 2017, of which 38 were General Counsel or Chief Legal Officer. First-GC mandates sit inside that 38. The GC clock is 24 days to shortlist and 11 weeks median to accepted offer (range 8-16). Offer acceptance on corporate mandates is 96 percent; 12-month retention of placed in-house leaders is 97 percent. The replacement term on a retained GC search is 12 months.
The CHRO at a family-owned manufacturing group spanning Milan and New York was stopped from copying a listed job description. The counsel they hired still does commercial and privacy.
Revenue under $50 million usually means one lawyer, often after a stretch of fractional cover. The board now wants a named officer who can sit in the room without a firm partner present. The work is still commercial: customer paper, employment, the cap table, the next financing.
A payments licence, a medical device, a fund, a platform that now holds personal data at EU scale. Outside counsel can paper the application; they cannot own the examination. The first GC is the person who will take the call from the supervisor.
Independent directors arrive. Minutes, conflicts, related-party, D&O, the secretary book. ACC's 2026 Chief Legal Officers Survey puts majority oversight of the corporate secretary function at 62 percent of CLOs — even a first GC inherits a version of that book.
A European company hiring into California or New York, or a US company hiring a DPO-adjacent lawyer for GDPR. The first GC in the new geography is often the first employee who can sign a local engagement letter. See in-house search in San Francisco and New York City.
Team-size bands we use in briefing: Seed-A often fractional (0-1); Series B-C / under $50 million, one lawyer; $50-250 million, two to four; high-growth SaaS, four to ten. Full sequencing is in building in-house legal teams.
Standing work, a board that wants a named officer, a regulator who will ask who owns the programme, or a financing that needs an internal signature. Retained search. GC clock: 24 days to shortlist, 11 weeks median to offer. 12-month replacement. This is the page you are on.
Two or three days a week, day-rate, live in a median of 7 days across 60+ interim and fractional engagements (counted separately from the 230+). When the board later wants a full-time officer, days billed credit against the retained fee. The conversion is a fractional general counsel engagement, not a different firm.
A first GC who has only run a mature department will try to hire a team the company cannot pay. A first GC who has only done contracts will freeze in front of the chair.
Customer paper, vendor paper, the financing, the employment suite. The person still drafts. At this stage there is no specialist bench behind them. If they cannot close a revenue contract without a firm, the hire has failed.
Can sit with independent directors without a script. Can explain risk in the company's numbers, not in doctrine. Can own a minutes pack. The first GC is often the de facto secretary.
Will sequence the next three hires — commercial counsel, privacy, employment — against volume, not against a listed org chart. Will know when to keep work inside and when to keep the panel. Will not staff a legal-ops function before there is a function.
Scorecard, reporting line, cash and equity, conflicts, off-limits. Written. No calls before this exists.
Sitting deputy GCs in the sector and geography. Software first-GC searches map deputies in software, not advertised GCs at listed groups.
Blind both ways until mutual interest. No CV leaves us without written candidate consent. NDA on request.
Assessment dossiers, not a CV stack. Every name on a first-GC shortlist must already be able to sit with the board.
CEO, chair, often one independent director. Offer engineering on notice, equity and the 12-month replacement term.
Onboarding, 90-day check-ins. 97 percent of placed in-house leaders still in post at 12 months; 91 percent at 24 months.
Process detail lives on how we run a search. Parent mandate: in-house and general counsel recruiting.
Every cash figure below is Sartori & Partners 2026 banding from closed first-GC and growth-GC mandates, except the large-cap total, which is proxy-disclosed context only.
| Seat | Base (USD unless noted) | Bonus | Source |
|---|---|---|---|
| Series B-C first GC | $240,000-$340,000 | 20-40% | Sartori closed searches, 2017-2026 |
| Growth-stage / pre-IPO GC | $300,000-$420,000 | 30-60% | Sartori closed searches, 2017-2026 |
| PE-backed portfolio GC | $280,000-$420,000 | 25-50% | Sartori closed searches, 2017-2026 |
| London first GC | £140,000-£220,000 | market bonus | Sartori closed searches, 2017-2026 |
| DIFC GC | $220,000-$380,000 | market bonus | Sartori closed searches, 2017-2026 |
| Large-cap listed GC (context only) | $650,000-$1.1 million base | Median TOTAL $3.4 million at the 500 largest US listed companies (not base) | SEC DEF 14A, 2025 season |
Do not blend the large-cap total into a first-GC base. Retained fee is 28-33 percent of first-year cash, fixed at engagement, three instalments (engagement / shortlist / start).
Source: Sartori & Partners FACTS ledger, 10 September 2026; proxy-disclosed GC compensation at the 500 largest US listed companies, SEC DEF 14A filings, 2025 season.
Benchmarks: general counsel salary 2026. Company hub: legal hiring for companies.
Case
Timeline: Shortlist day 24; accepted offer week 10.
Client references
First legal hire. They stopped us copying a listed-company GC job description. The counsel we hired still does commercial and privacy.
We thought we needed a full-time GC. They said fractional for two quarters, then a permanent search. Both were right. The fractional counsel started in a week.
The practical guide for founders, CEOs and CHROs deciding the seat.
Read the guideHow the first hire sequences the next three.
Read the team buildParent mandate: first GC, successor GC, deputy, specialists.
Parent serviceDays-per-week officer when the company is not yet a five-day seat.
Fractional GCConfidential successor while the incumbent still sits.
Succession searchIn-house, compliance, legal operations and interim under one corporate desk.
Company hubWhen standing legal work outgrows outside counsel managed ad hoc, typically around Series B to C. The usual triggers are a first regulated product, a board that now meets as a board, a US or EU expansion, or outside-counsel spend that has become a line item the CFO cannot explain. We scope the seat against revenue and team size — Series B-C companies under $50 million of revenue usually have one lawyer; $50-250 million usually have two to four — so the hire matches the work, not a copied listed-company job description. See hiring your first general counsel and building in-house legal teams.
Hire fractional counsel when the work is real but not yet a five-day-a-week officer seat. A Series C payments company in San Francisco started fractional for two quarters, then opened a permanent search; the fractional counsel was live in a week. Days billed on the fractional engagement credit against a later retained fee. Read fractional and part-time general counsel before you freeze a full-time brief.
A first GC must be commercial, board-ready, and able to build a function from nothing. Pedigree at a listed group is often the wrong copy: the seat still does commercial contracts, privacy, employment and the board pack. We map sitting deputy GCs in the sector who have already been the last lawyer in the room. The scorecard companies use for a new GC is the same three cuts, scaled to a first hire.
On the 38 GC and CLO searches since 2017, the shortlist arrived in 24 days and the median accepted offer in 11 weeks. The range is 8-16 weeks from Mandate Blueprint to accepted offer. That is slower than a specialist counsel search (18 days to shortlist, 8 weeks to offer) because the board, the CEO and often the chair all sit on the interviews. See how we run a search.
For a Series B to C first GC we see cash of $240,000 to $340,000 base plus a 20 to 40 percent bonus. Growth-stage and pre-IPO seats run $300,000 to $420,000 base with a 30 to 60 percent bonus; London first GCs sit at £140,000 to £220,000. Proxy-disclosed general counsel compensation at the 500 largest US listed companies (SEC DEF 14A filings, 2025 season) shows a median TOTAL of $3.4 million — large-cap context, not a first-GC bid, and not a base salary. The retained fee is 28-33 percent of first-year cash, fixed at engagement, paid in three instalments. Full bands: general counsel salary 2026.
Yes. First-GC, successor-GC and CLO searches run retained, with a fee fixed in writing before outreach. Three instalments: engagement, shortlist, start. The replacement window is 12 months. We never approach lawyers we placed for as long as they stay, and we do not recruit from a client's legal department for 24 months after a mandate. Fee, replacement window and off-limits are in the letter before we call anyone.
We have completed corporate mandates in 23 countries and 41 cities, including California, New York, London and the Gulf. California and San Francisco are the densest first-GC markets we run; New York, London, Houston and Dubai follow. City pages for in-house search include in-house counsel recruiting in San Francisco, Los Angeles, Boston and New York City.
First legal officer
Retained. Fee, replacement window and off-limits in the letter before we call anyone. No obligation.
