Amanda Albert focuses her practice on advising both public and private clients on employee benefits, employment and executive compensation matters. She counsels clients on the full range of related tax, ERISA, governance, securities and regulatory issues that arise in connection with the design, implementation and operation of employee benefit and executive compensation plans, Ms. Albert’s experience includes advising on defined benefit, 401(k) and other defined contribution plans, ESPPs, nonqualified deferred compensation plans, section 125 cafeteria plans, severance plans and other welfare benefit plans. She represents employers before the IRS and Department of Labor in connection with investigations and in voluntary compliance matters. 

In addition to counseling employers on a regular basis, Ms. Albert has extensive experience in the handling of benefits aspects of mergers and acquisitions, spin-offs, initial public offerings, reorganizations and restructurings, in both the US domestic and cross border contexts. She regularly negotiates and drafts the full suite of benefit and compensation plans that come into play in the transactional context, including employment agreements, change in control plans, retention bonus plans and severance arrangements.

Ms. Albert also advises banks, funds and other investment and financial services clients on the ERISA aspects of working with employee benefit plan investors. In addition to working with private equity funds in structuring to avoid application of ERISA’s plan asset rules, Ms. Albert counsels banks, underwriters and issuers in connection with the drafting of ERISA provisions in offering documents and credit facilities. As with her M&A experience, Ms. Albert’s expertise extends to the application of ERISA to products offered by non-US institutions, with the goal of making these products eligible for ERISA investors.

Ms. Albert also supports the firm’s exempt organization practice in navigating the complex tax rules that apply to executive compensation arrangements in the tax-exempt sector.

Prior to joining the firm, she was a partner at another international law firm where she focused on executive compensation matters.