Deputy General Counsel
- Recruiter
- New Town Partnership
- Location
- Dundee, Dundee City
- Salary
- A competitive package that reflects the gravitas and seniority of this role will be offered
- Posted
- 08 Jun 2018
- Closes
- 06 Jul 2018
- Ref
- JG080618
- Job Title
- General Counsel
- Practice Area
- Commercial Contracts, Company / Commercial, Corporate
- Contract Type
- Permanent
- Hours
- Full Time
The Opportunity:
Our client is a privately-owned company based in Scotland who are seeking a commercially mature number two to the General Counsel. This role will take legal responsibility for a range of diverse commercial work and be trained as part of a succession plan. Acting as Deputy to the General Counsel the successful applicant will perform a wide variety of tasks in order to advise the Board, whilst also managing legal risk across a complex and varied business. It will be essential for the incoming Deputy to establish a strong relationship with the Board and C-suite management team, maintaining a strong commercial lens in all aspects of their work.
The successful candidate will join the business at a significant stage of its growth and development. As an organisation they are acquisitive in nature and M&A experience will be highly advantageous. You will be tasked with leading crucial business projects and managing external counsel where needed. A team will be in place and will report direct to this position, therefore a proven ability of managing people and working in a non-hierarchical environment is necessary.
The Role:
As incoming Deputy General Counsel, you will take over the operational delivery from the General Counsel and work to support the development and implementation of the legal strategy across the Group. Additionally, you will take point on identifying, evaluating, managing and mitigating legal risk across all areas of the business.
An overview of the responsibilities below:
Managing the day-to-day Group Legal operations, including work allocation across a range of areas including:
- Commercial agreements (including distribution and agency agreements, IT development, licence and support agreements and procurement agreements.)
- IP related matters (including licensing agreements, content acquisition/usage arrangements, marketing, publicity and related services agreements and advice on trade mark infringement issues and the development of new IP by the company.)
- Digital agreements and projects including licensing, development and distribution and the legal aspects of the new initiative in digital and related environments.
- Corporate transactions.
- Providing strategic advice to the business in connection with the implementation of contractual arrangements, new business opportunities and the handling of contentious matters.
- Providing legal support on corporate transactions (investment, M&A) across the Group.
- Act as a point of escalation for the Group Legal team.
- Staying abreast of legal developments affecting the Group, its customers and partners.
- Developing internal guidelines, toolkits and know-how on various legal and business issues.
- Managing and directing the work of external legal advisors.
- Identifying legal training needs throughout the business and ensuring training is provided by the legal team or external providers as appropriate.
- Supervising and managing the development of the in-house counsel team.
Skills and Experience:
To be considered for this role it will be essential that you bring significant in-house experience, ideally from a Retail, Manufacturing, FMCG or media environment. As well as a law degree or equivalent qualification you will be able to demonstrate a strong academic background and legal training ideally in a major UK law firm. You will have experience of the following:
- A strong commercial legal background, including corporate transactional experience.
- Experience of leadership and staff management.
- Strong commercial interest and awareness of business issues.
- Quick learner and pragmatic.
- Excellent organisational, analytical and problem-solving skills.
- A team player with a good mix of interpersonal, legal and business skills.
- Excellent communication, presentation and negation skills – ability to present complex information to all levels of the organisation.
- Flexible in mindset with the ability to inspire confidence in others and participate in a highly collaborative environment.
This role offers an excellent and rare opportunity to join a dynamic business. As Deputy Counsel your expertise will influence the leadership of the organisation and you should be comfortable presenting information at Board level. Most importantly, you will bring a highly commercial edge to all aspects of legal risk management and how that pertains to the business.
A competitive package that reflects the gravitas and seniority of this role will be offered to the successful candidate.
New Town Partnership is the exclusively retained advisor to the company for this search. All direct and third-party applicants will be forward to New Town Partnership.
For a confidential conversation please contact Jane Gilchrist on 0131 210 0020 or
apply online. All applications will be considered and acknowledged.