Hannah Gordon

Chief Administrative Officer and General Counsel

13th NFL Season; 11th with 49ers

Hannah Gordon is entering her 11th season with the 49ers and fourth as chief administrative officer and general counsel.

In her role, Gordon oversees Legal, Public Affairs and Strategic Communications, Risk Management, Community Relations, Fan Engagement, the 49ers Museum, and the 49ers Foundation, including its award-winning direct programs, 49ers EDU which excites youth about STEAM through football, and 49ers PREP which promotes wellness for youth, including through free in-school programming and free co-ed flag football leagues around the Bay Area.  Under her guidance, the 49ers have been named the ESPN Sports Humanitarian Team of the Year, Pop Warner Little Scholars Team of the Year, and Silicon Valley Business Journal Community Impact Award winner.  

Gordon advises on all legal issues involving both the football team and Levi’s® Stadium. She is also the Secretary of the Bay Area Host Committee and has been involved with events such as Super Bowl 50, WrestleMania 31, Beyoncé’s Formation World Tour, the Copa America Centenario, and the 2019 College Football Playoff National Championship.  Gordon is active in league-wide matters, has served on multiple intra-league working groups, and the NFL Player Tuition Assistance Plan and the NFL Severance Pay Plan.  

Under her leadership, the 49ers launched the first fan engagement community for LGBTQ+ fans and allies in professional sports to national acclaim.  Fan Engagement also relaunched WON, the official women’s club of the Forty Niners, doubling membership and creating a monthly digital magazine. 

Gordon joined the 49ers in 2011 as director of legal affairs, a role she held for four seasons, before becoming the vice president of legal and government affairs in 2015, then general counsel from 2016-17.  Gordon came to the 49ers from the NFL Management Council where she worked on NFL player contracts, salary cap compliance, the 2011 NFL collective bargaining agreement, and labor issues, including the 2011 lockout. Prior to the NFL, Gordon practiced at Latham & Watkins LLP and earlier in her career worked for the athletic department at the University of California at Berkeley.

Gordon was named to the Sports Business Journal’s Forty Under 40 list in 2021 and ICA Cristo Rey gave her its Leader in Mission Award.  Gordon is a member of the 2020 Class of Presidential Leadership Scholars, co-selected by the Clinton Foundation and the George W. Bush Presidential Center. In 2020, she was also named to PureWow’s “20 in ’20 Up-and-Coming Leaders Working to Better Our World. In 2019, Gordon was named to the Silicon Valley Business Journal’s 100 Women of Influence. In 2017, she received the Silicon Valley Business Journal and San Francisco Business Times’ Corporate Counsel Diversity Champion of the Year award for the work she did along with 49ers ownership on restructuring the 49ers Denise DeBartolo York Fellowship and making the 49ers the first team in the NFL to implement a diverse slate interviewing policy.  In 2015, Gordon was named to the Legal 500’s GC Powerlist – U.S. Rising Stars. 

Gordon has served on the boards of the Silicon Valley Leadership Group Foundation Board, San Jose State’s Institute for the Study of Sport, Society, and Social Change, and the Santa Clara University Institute for Sports Law and Ethics. 

A native of Oakland, California, Gordon earned her B.A. summa cum laude from UCLA where she was the first female football beat writer for The Daily Bruin.  Gordon holds a J.D. from Stanford, where she previously served as a Lecturer In Law.