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The opportunity
An excellent opportunity has arisen for an in-house professional to join the central Office of the General Counsel team as a Corporate/Commercial specialist.
The position would be ideally suited to an individual with experience of working within the in-house team of a comparable business or someone looking for their first in-house legal role.
The team
The Office of General Counsel team is the firm’s in-house legal team, which reports to the General Counsel, working alongside the Risk and Compliance team. The Office of the General Counsel at Bird & Bird is committed to providing a consistently high level of service for the firm and its partners and staff, in relation to all risk and compliance issues. Under the leadership of the team’s Legal Director, it is aligned with and supports the firm's strategy, always promoting a One Firm culture.
The function currently comprises a central team in London, with a team of 8 staff, consisting of a mixture of lawyers and non-lawyers.
The team deals with a variety of issues, from supporting the Firm’s corporate affairs, agreeing the terms upon which the firm engages with its clients and its suppliers, advising on commercial business decisions, legal tech, innovation, ESG and other areas of operational risk management. As such it plays a key role in protecting the Bird & Bird brand and promoting the commercial interests of the Firm. We are looking for candidates with a keen interest in in-house corporate affairs and a pragmatic and commercial approach who are looking to develop their skills.
What you'll do
Reporting to the Legal Director of the Office of the General Counsel, the role will adopt primary responsibility for the management of the Firm’s Corporate affairs and management, with an opportunity to contribute more broadly to the remainder of the team’s activities.
In particular, the successful candidate will have responsibility for:
- Manage the day-to-day operations of the Firm’s own corporate affairs, for all entities falling under the Bird & Bird group
- Drawing together input from other internal subject matter experts, including in Tax and Finance
- Manage the production of necessary documents for the delivery of corporate governance and regulatory maintenance activities
- Manage the preparation of transactional documents for ad-hoc advisory projects
- Manage the process of incorporating companies, LLPs and branches
- Provide support to the delivery of board meetings
- Initiate change where appropriate, build internal and external networks to expand the service offered to the Firm by the team, and raise team profile
- Lead on co-ordination with other members of the UK and overseas teams
- Supervising the work of more junior members of the In-House team working in the above workstreams
- Dealing with ad hoc queries and being a trusted advisor on a wide range of risk issues where required
- Develop and run any appropriate training for internal stakeholders and upskill more junior team members
- Review, draft and negotiate commercial agreements that the Firm is considering entering into in a variety of contexts
About you
Your skills and attributes
- Excellent team player
- Private practice experience preferred
- A confident yet diplomatic manner – someone adept at explaining new concepts to a group of people and tactfully challenging the status quo, both orally and in writing
- Ability and enthusiasm to handle complex workflow and team pressures by prioritising work effectively and identifying level of detail needed for each task
- Conscientious and methodical approach to problem solving
- Respecting need for discretion
- Excellent persuasive and reasoning skills and the ability to recognise when to escalate an issue and to whom
- Knowledge of key areas of the law by providing clear, precise, practical advice
- The ability to use initiative and a confidence built upon solid success and achievements
- The ability to liaise effectively with internal stakeholders as required
- Delegation and supervisory skills where appropriate
- A commitment regularly to update your own technical expertise and to achieve continuous improvement and development
Qualifications and experience
- Qualified Solicitor (or overseas equivalent) with at least 4 years post qualification experience
- Proven prior experience in working with corporate or company secretarial matters is essential, and a good knowledge of governance and Companies House procedures
- Proven experience in managing the corporate affairs of an international group
- Experience of managing the affairs of partnerships (highly desirable)
- Experience of attending and minuting board meetings (highly desirable)
- Experience in reviewing, drafting and negotiating commercial agreements
- A clear understanding of the importance of high standards of client care and attention to detail
- Essential applications experience: Outlook, Word, Excel and document management, with an understanding and wiliness to work with AI to enhance team outputs
The main responsibilities of this role are outlined above; however, this description is not exhaustive, and the job holder may be required to undertake additional duties from time to time to ensure the smooth running of the department. The role may require some working outside our normal working hours of 9:30am- 5:30pm.
