Senior Legal Hold Specialist

Job Title: Senior Legal Hold Specialist

Location:
United Arab Emirates (Remote) Employment Type: Full-Time Work Arrangement: 100% Remote
- Work From Home Level: Senior

About the Role
The Senior Legal Hold Specialist is responsible for coordinating and administering legal hold processes to preserve potentially relevant information, records, and electronically stored information (ESI) in response to litigation, investigations, regulatory inquiries, audits, and other legal matters. The role focuses on legal hold implementation, custodian identification, preservation notices, acknowledgement tracking, data retention coordination, and defensible documentation. Working fully remotely, the specialist collaborates with legal counsel, compliance teams, information technology, records management, cybersecurity, and business stakeholders to support effective information preservation and reduce the risk of unauthorized deletion or alteration of relevant records.

Key Responsibilities

Coordinate the end-to-end administration of legal hold processes in accordance with instructions from authorized legal counsel. Receive and track legal hold requests relating to litigation, regulatory investigations, internal inquiries, audits, and other preservation obligations. Identify relevant custodians, departments, systems, repositories, and categories of information for preservation based on approved legal instructions. Prepare and distribute legal hold notices, reminders, acknowledgement requests, and related communications. Monitor custodian acknowledgements and follow up on outstanding responses or preservation confirmations. Coordinate with IT, records management, and information security teams to implement appropriate preservation measures. Maintain legal hold registers, matter records, custodian lists, preservation logs, and supporting documentation. Track changes in employee status, organizational structure, data ownership, and system access that may affect preservation obligations. Coordinate the suspension or modification of routine records disposal and automated deletion processes where instructed and authorized. Support the preservation of emails, collaboration-platform content, business documents, databases, messaging records, and other potentially relevant ESI. Monitor legal hold compliance and elevate overdue acknowledgements, preservation gaps, or potential risks to legal counsel. Coordinate periodic reviews of active legal holds to confirm whether preservation requirements remain in effect. Support legal hold release procedures following documented authorization from the responsible legal team. Maintain clear audit trails of notices issued, acknowledgements received, preservation actions, escalations, and release approvals. Assist with the preparation of reports covering active matters, custodian populations, compliance status, and outstanding preservation actions. Support the coordination of data collection and e-discovery activities with authorized legal and technical specialists. Review legal hold procedures, templates, workflows, and operational controls to identify opportunities for improvement. Contribute to employee awareness initiatives covering legal holds, record preservation, and document retention responsibilities. Protect confidential, privileged, commercially sensitive, and personal information throughout the legal hold process.
Qualifications and Experience
Bachelor's degree in Law, Legal Studies, Information Governance, Records Management, Business Administration, or a related discipline. Significant experience in legal hold administration, litigation support, e-discovery coordination, records management, or legal operations. Strong understanding of legal hold workflows, document preservation principles, and electronic records management. Familiarity with electronically stored information, data retention schedules, litigation support processes, and preservation requirements. Experience coordinating with legal counsel, IT teams, compliance departments, and business stakeholders. Knowledge of email systems, enterprise collaboration platforms, document repositories, and information management environments. Familiarity with e-discovery and legal hold platforms such as Relativity, Microsoft Purview, or comparable solutions. Understanding of data privacy, confidentiality, information security, and records governance principles. Ability to maintain accurate matter registers, custodian records, acknowledgement logs, and audit documentation. Strong organizational skills and the ability to manage multiple legal matters and preservation deadlines. Excellent written communication skills, particularly when preparing formal notices and procedural guidance. High attention to detail and sound judgment when handling sensitive legal and business information. Ability to identify process gaps, elevate preservation risks, and coordinate timely corrective action. Strong stakeholder management skills and the abilit