Senior Manager, Business Affairs

Please Note: If you are a current Spin Master employee with access to Workday, apply to this job via the Workday application.

Are you a kid at heart looking to build a career with a leading global children's toy, entertainment and digital gaming company?

At Spin Master, our unwavering commitment to open mindedness, integrity and innovation is a great part of what has made us an industry leader. How do we stay ahead of the pack? By hiring the best and brightest minds—and that’s why we want you!

What will you work on?

The Senior Manager, Business Affairs will work closely with the entire Entertainment Business & Legal Affairs and Finance teams. The Senior Manager, Business Affairs is responsible for the management of Entertainment's business affairs encompassing television, film, short form, music and other audio/visual content. The Senior Manager, Business Affairs role includes the preparation, negotiation and tracking of a majority of the business affairs and legal documents for development and production, and assisting the Business & Legal Affairs and Finance teams with internal financing documentation for each project to ensure compliance with and eligibility for tax credits.

How will you create impact?

• Negotiate, draft and finalize all required releases per project.
• Review, comment on and negotiate applicable third party agreements for Development and Production.
• Develop and implement Entertainment’s film production standard practices and precedents.
• Responsible for all day-to-day business affairs and contract matters for Production.
• Manage all legal and business affairs music matters in consultation with Entertainment team and external counsel (as necessary), including drafting and negotiation of songwriter, composer, performer and other related music agreements, advising Entertainment and other divisions of Spin Master on music rights (e.g. ownership, clearance, permissible uses, royalties, guild/union considerations, etc.), and coordination with third party music administrators to ensure accurate and complete royalty tracking and collection. With the assistance of the Business Affairs Coordinator, track and diarize legal and business affairs deliverables for each project, and ensure that all such deliverables are delivered on a timely basis.
• Ensure timely and complete copyright registrations as necessary for each production.
• Oversee creation and maintenance of a system for tracking key dates such as contract term and option expiry dates; credit, publicity, promotion and related obligations; all other contractual obligations; and, tracking all of the foregoing.
• Other business affairs tasks as may be required by the VP, Legal & Business Affairs, Entertainment.
• Responsible for all guild/union matters, including registrations with applicable guilds, communication with such guilds, advocate/negotiate on behalf of Entertainment, and ensure strict compliance with all applicable guilds/unions for all projects in development and production.
• Seek advice from Corporate legal team and external counsel as/when necessary.
• Work closely with insurance brokers and Finance/Risk team to secure all required insurance for each project including production, cast, and errors & omissions insurance, as applicable, as well as maintaining and updating Entertainment’s library insurance policy. Obtain final insurance certificates for internal record keeping and delivery to third parties as/when required or requested.
• Prepare all internal chain of title documents to ensure necessary contracts and rights are vested in the appropriate Spin Master entities.
• Train and supervise Business Affairs Coordinators in drafting certain standard Development and Production contracts based on templates.
• Implement and oversee Production and Development teams’ use of approved templates for certain standard contracts.
• Create and update templates for Entertainment's Development and Production agreements including writer agreements, summit agreements, story editor agreements, showrunner agreements, director agreements, talent agreements, and all other agreements required in animation development and production.
• Oversee contract filing and record keeping in accordance with Entertainment’s policies.
• Request and track insurance certificates as required to be obtained by third parties involved in Development and Production.
• Coordinate with external legal counsel to incorporate and organize new single purpose production entities upon greenlight of each new production, and communicate with external counsel any required updates to such entities.
• Support the Entertainment Finance team to maximize tax credits and provide or draft, as necessary, any documents required in connection therewith, including chain of title and financing documents to establish and maintain eligibility for tax credits, and comply with internal cash flow policies and requirements.
• Negotiate and draft more complex Development and Production contracts with legal assistance from the lawyers on the team.

What are your skills and experience?

• The Osgoode Certificate in Entertainment Law is considered an asset.
• A thorough understanding of all of the rules, laws, regulations, and policies regarding development and production of Canadian content animated productions including CAVCO and Ontario Creates rules and policies, and equivalent in other Provinces.
• A thorough understanding of all applicable union and guild agreements including with ACTRA, SAG-AFTRA, WGC, WGA, DGC, DGA and IATSE.
• 8-12 years' business affairs experience and/or equivalent legal training or professional legal experience
• Direct experience in business affairs in Canadian content children's animation industry preferred.
• Proficiency working in Word, Excel, Adobe Acrobat and contract management software.

What You Can Expect From Us

Our mission is to Make Life More Fun with a vision to push the boundaries of innovation, creativity, and fun.

• Flexible Work Hours
• Growth and Career Opportunities
• Innovation, Collaboration and Fun
• Other fun Perks!
• Comprehensive Benefits

What’s it like to work here?

Spin Master is a fast-paced, hands-on organization that provides many great opportunities for impactful decision-making; though our challenging start-up atmosphere isn’t for everyone, we have a proven record of opportunities for future advancement and internal transfers for our passionate and results driven team.

Everyone is welcome in our sandbox and we are committed to an accessible and inclusive hiring process that provides reasonable accommodation to all applicants.

Spin Master strives to create an accessible and inclusive application and selection process and is committed to working with and providing reasonable accommodation to job applicants who may require provisions to participate in the recruitment, selection and/or assessment processes. Should you require an accommodation, please contact our Talent Acquisition team, by email at [email protected] or by phone at 416 364-6002 and we will work with you to meet your accessibility needs.

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We do appreciate all interest; however only those selected for interview will be contacted.