Senior Counsel Legal Domain Expert
Listing checked August 29, 2026 · pay as published by Mercor
Overview
An AI lab in the Bay Area seeks an experienced lawyer with 8 to 15 years of post-qualification practice to help research teams improve how frontier models handle real legal work. The engagement runs through Cincinnatus LLC as a full-time W-2 position, with work inside the client's own systems and a hybrid schedule that requires regular on-site presence. You will evaluate the quality of legal knowledge tasks, write instruction specs and golden solutions, and build benchmarks that show whether the model improves. The role targets lawyers at counsel or senior associate level with deep specialization, and partners, general counsel, and early-career lawyers should apply through the seniority-matched listings.
What You'll Do6
- 1Audit legal knowledge tasks and model outputs for missing behaviors, weak reasoning, and answers that sound confident but fail professional review.
- 2Write precise instruction specs and golden solutions that define correct answers for legal problems.
- 3Design new legal tasks and evaluation sets that reflect real-world practice in your specialty.
- 4Build legal-specific skills and tools in collaboration with the research team.
- 5Align evaluation standards with client researchers and adjacent specialists by turning tacit legal judgment into explicit criteria.
- 6Deliver structured written feedback that helps improve both the data and the model.
Requirements9
- 1Juris Doctor from an accredited law school, with a top-ranked program preferred.
- 28 to 15 years of substantive legal practice after qualification at a law firm, corporate legal department, regulatory body, or court, with internships and clerkships excluded.
- 3Current or prior level of counsel, senior associate, senior in-house counsel, or Assistant General Counsel with real ownership of matters.
- 4Specialization in a specific practice area such as corporate and transactional, litigation, regulatory and compliance, intellectual property, employment and labor, or tax.
- 5Active membership in at least one U.S. state bar in good standing.
- 6Hands-on experience using large language models in daily professional work, with the ability to distinguish well-reasoned answers from plausible-sounding errors.
- 7Ability to commit to 40 hours per week for an initial 6-month engagement.
- 8Residence in the Bay Area or willingness to relocate there at your own cost before the start date, with no relocation assistance.
- 9Strong written communication and precise, well-structured feedback skills.
Who Should Apply
Lawyers who thrive in this role have 8 to 15 years of practice, own a specific legal specialty, and already use large language models as a normal part of producing or reviewing legal work. They should enjoy turning tacit professional judgment into written guidelines and test questions that a model can learn from. The role does not fit partners, general counsel, or lawyers below counsel level, and it is not a remote position. You must live in the Bay Area or move there at your own expense. Candidates often lose out when they treat this as a general legal advisory job, when their experience is too broad rather than deep, or when they cannot show concrete examples of using LLMs to evaluate legal reasoning.
Salary Insight
Pay is $85 to $120 per hour, positioned for counsel-level lawyers with substantial specialization. Cincinnatus LLC provides the full-time W-2 assignment, including payroll, benefits, and tax handling rather than a 1099 contract.
Pay and demand for Legal roles
AggregatedTypical pay
$70/hour
This role
$85–$120/hr
Most Legal roles pay $40–$100 per hour. This role's pay sits above that range.
Based on 979 similar roles that publish pay · 300 publish only a top rate; those count at the rate they gave
Rates shown per hour. Yearly and monthly pay converted; one-time fees and non-USD pay are not included.
- Live similar roles
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- Listed in last 30 days
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- 98%
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Most requested skills · share of roles
- ai training14%
- ai evaluation12%
- llm evaluation12%
- data annotation10%
Figures from Legal roles live on NearSkill when this page loaded. A role can close before you apply, so check the listing itself.
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Compensation
$85–120/hr
Required Skills
Application Tip
In your application, name your primary legal specialty and give a specific example of a time you used an LLM to catch a subtle legal error. State your bar admission and years of post-qualification experience, and note whether you live in the Bay Area or plan to relocate there.
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