Contract attorneys and legal professionals help businesses navigate complex agreements including vendor contracts, partnership terms, licensing deals, and merger and acquisition (M&A) transactions. Whether you're a startup finalizing your first software as a service (SaaS) agreement or an enterprise managing multi-party negotiations, experienced contract counsel can reduce risk, strengthen your position, and ensure every term is enforceable and aligned with your goals.
What does a contract lawyer or legal professional do?
Contract lawyers and legal professionals are licensed individuals specializing in legal agreements and contract negotiations and drafting. They advise and represent clients on a variety of legal matters including employment contracts, non-disclosure agreements (NDAs), mergers and acquisitions, leases, contract disputes, and business contracts.
Work for lawyers and legal professionals typically involves:
Drafting clear, compliant contracts. They create legal documents such as vendor contracts, employment contracts, partnership agreements, and service-level agreements, ensuring terms are legally accurate, aligned with regulatory compliance, and drafted to protect against future disputes.
Reviewing and negotiating terms. They analyze existing contracts, identify legal issues, assess risks, and negotiate revisions to secure more favorable terms while protecting the business from long-term exposure.
Advising on legal risks and obligations. They explain contract clauses, outline potential liabilities, guide clients on meeting legal requirements, and recommend legal solutions that support best practices in corporate governance.
Resolving contract disputes. They help address breaches, mediate disagreements, and support litigation when necessary, ensuring disputes are handled efficiently and in line with contractual and regulatory obligations.
Supporting business operations. They collaborate with founders, executives, project managers, and procurement teams to ensure contracts align with operational needs, corporate policies, and long-term business goals.
How to hire a contract lawyer on Upwork
Hiring the right contract lawyer starts with understanding your legal needs and clearly outlining them. Whether you're drafting agreements, reviewing terms, or navigating negotiations, defining your scope early helps attract professionals with the right legal expertise.
Step 1: Post a job
Start by creating a clear and detailed job post that explains the legal support you need. In your post:
Outline the type of contract work involved, such as drafting, reviewing, revising, or negotiating
Specify the contract type (e.g., service agreement, NDA, partnership contract, licensing agreement)
Include key details like the project timeline, industry context, required experience, and whether you need ongoing legal support
To quickly draft a tailored job post, try the Job Post Generator powered by Uma™, Upwork's Mindful AI. Describe what you need in a few sentences, and Uma will create a draft in seconds. You can also use job description templates as a starting point for your post.
Step 2: Evaluate candidates
As proposals come in, you’ll want to review them systematically to help ensure you find someone with the knowledge and specialization to meet your legal requirements.
Upwork's Best Match insights, powered by Uma, can help you quickly identify candidates whose experience aligns with your needs
Review proposals for signs that the candidate understands your needs and has a clear solution
Review profiles for expertise in relevant jurisdictions and contract types
Check portfolios to gauge their drafting style and attention to detail
Read client feedback to understand their communication style and reliability
Step 3: Interview your top choices
Interviews provide an opportunity to assess how a candidate thinks through your issue, and how your collaboration might look.
Ask about past contract drafting and negotiation experience and any similar projects they've handled
Discuss their approach to identifying risks, clarifying terms, and simplifying legal language
Talk through the basics of what you need, and have them outline how they might approach it
You can schedule and conduct interviews within Upwork Messages and receive immediate transcripts and summaries. You can also review interview questions for freelancers to help structure your conversations.
Step 4: Agree on scope and begin work
Before the person you choose can begin work, you’ll need to have a clear contract in place. Contracts protect both parties and help collaborations be successful from beginning to end.
Use Upwork’s tools and services for creating and managing contracts, and processing payments
Choose fixed-price contracts for projects with clear deliverables, such as drafting a contract or supporting a negotiation
Set milestones to break larger projects into manageable deliverables, for example a certain number of drafts in a set period
Choose hourly contracts for ongoing projects, such as working through a complex negotiation or updating many employment contracts for different positions
Once the contract has started, you can share files securely by uploading them through Upwork messaging.