Natalie A. Pierce

Natalie Pierce is a Partner and Chair of the Employment & Labor Group at Gunderson Dettmer. She represents emerging companies, venture capital and growth equity firms. Natalie is a trusted advisor to clients on all employment-related matters, including: recruiting, hiring, managing and compensating employees; compliance with all relevant regulations at the federal, state and local levels; and avoiding issues such as harassment, discrimination and pay inequity. Natalie has handled the workforce-related aspects of numerous transactions and reorganizations, including maximizing value through smooth transitional plans for service agreements and pre- and post-closing integration activities. If problems do arise, Natalie is also a litigator who has successfully defended clients against a variety of employment claims.

Natalie also focuses her practice on the future of work, including counseling companies on incorporation of generative artificial intelligence and other transformative technologies. She also hosts Gunderson’s FutureWork Playbook podcast.

Natalie has received a variety of accolades, including being named a Fast Case 50 Award Winner, one of Daily Journal’s “Top Artificial Intelligence Lawyers” and “Top Labor and Employment Lawyers,” Chambers USA’s “Minority Lawyer of the Year,” American Lawyer “Best Mentor,” San Francisco Business Times “Bay Area’s Most Influential Women,” and was a member of the Governing Council of the ABA’s Center for Innovation. Natalie co-authored “Why Law Firms Must Responsibly Embrace Generative AI” featured in CLS Blue Sky Blog, Bloomberg Law and Law360, and co-authored the AI ethics chapter of “AI and the Legal Profession: Transforming the Future of Law,” slated for publication in 2023 by Global Law and Business.

Natalie earned her B.A. at UC Berkeley with Honors, and her law degree from Columbia University School of Law, where she was a Harlan Fiske Stone Scholar and recipient of the Emil Schlesinger Labor Law Prize at graduation.