About the founder
Ali Jubelirer
Employment lawyer, former General Counsel, CHRO, and Chief Compliance Officer, and the knowledge source that powers Tova.
Credentials
- J.D., Loyola University Chicago School of Law
- B.A., Penn State, Phi Beta Kappa
- SPHR, Senior HR Professional
- CCEP, Certified Compliance & Ethics Professional
- Illinois Bar (2000); N.D. Ill.; 7th Cir.; E.D. Mich.
Why I built The People Pocket
Over 26 years I have been the person managers call when something has already gone sideways, the termination that was documented three weeks too late, the accommodation request nobody engaged with, the investigation that started as a Slack DM. Most of those calls did not need a lawyer. They needed a seasoned HR business partner ninety minutes earlier, asking the right questions before anyone did anything.
Small and mid-sized employers almost never have that person on staff. They have a founder, an office manager wearing an HR hat, or a fractional consultant who can't be everywhere at once. Tova is the answer to that gap: an AI HR business partner that behaves like the colleague I wish every manager had in their back pocket, one who slows the conversation down, gathers the facts, and gets in front of the issue before it blows up into something much bigger and more costly.
Background
In June 2026 I left Benesch Friedlander Coplan & Aronoff LLP, where I had been Of Counsel in the Litigation Practice Group and co-chair of the Cannabis & Hemp Industry Group, to found AJ Legal, my own strategic employment and business counsel practice. Before that I served as Outside General Counsel and CHRO at AeroPayments, and as General Counsel and CHRO at Revolution Global, overseeing legal, HR, and compliance end-to-end.
For eight years I was VP, Deputy General Counsel and Chief Compliance Officer at Groupon, leading global employment and compliance across the U.S., Dublin, and more than a dozen other jurisdictions, Code of Conduct, record retention, investigations, works councils, WARN closures, and the whole M&A employment docket. Earlier I was Senior Employment Counsel at Tribune Company and a labor & employment associate at Seyfarth Shaw.
That combination, outside counsel, in-house GC, CHRO, and CCO, is why Tova is designed the way she is. She is not a chatbot bolted onto case law. She is the habits of an experienced HRBP: ask, document, assess risk, plan the conversation, and only then act.
Law firm
When a situation genuinely needs a lawyer, not just judgment, I practice through AJ Legal, my strategic employment and business counsel firm for founders, executives, and growth-stage companies.
alijlegal.com →The People Pocket is a separate product and does not provide legal advice. Nothing on this page or in the Service creates an attorney-client relationship.
Recognition
- Top 200 Global Cannabis Attorneys, Global Top 200 Directory, 2024/25
- Moderator, Benzinga Cannabis Conference, 2025
- Speaker: MJBiz 2025, MJU OnPoint 2026, Hemp Beverage Expo 2026, IgniteIt Capital 2026