Title: Legal Counsel (PT or FT)
Location: Redhill, Surrey. Hybrid working.
Summary: General Corporate legal & commercial contract work across multiple Group companies within the UK covering all areas from factories, procurement, customers, brand marketing, HR & all legal documentation.
Reporting Line: CFO
Direct Reports: None
Working Relationships (Internal/External): Nordics Legal Manager, Group Lactalis legal in France, Lactalis UK Directors, Factory & Commercial Managers.
Main tasks and responsibilities:
Commercial
- Working closely with the Legal Manager in drafting, reviewing, and managing legal documents including, but not limited to, resolutions, legal reports, contracts, supplier agreements, NDA’s & commercial licensing agreements.
- Providing time-sensitive legal, commercial, operational, and regulatory advice to internal stakeholders on all aspects of commercial deals with both suppliers & customers.
- Provide counsel and project management on strategic deals and projects.
- Resolve issues that arise in existing commercial relationships with suppliers & customers.
- Assist Procurement team in developing and implementing efficient and streamlined contract negotiation and vendor management processes, for all sites.
- Support managers in relevant functions to negotiate contracts.
- Provide legal support on ad-hoc projects and field queries across a range of business functions (e.g. Finance, People, Marketing, Sales, Supply Chain, Procurement, Milk purchasing from farmers, IT and Industrial).
Corporate Legal work
- Assist the CFO in handling general corporate legal matters and management of documentation for all UK Group legal companies.
- Organize and maintain corporate records for UK entities, ensuring they are updated and easily accessible, and that they are compliant with corporate governance requirements.
- Assist CFO in presenting reports to senior executives, stakeholders, and board members.
- Work with Group & Nordics Legal Team to develop and implement efficient legal procedures.
Training & Compliance
- Lead training for UK employees with regard Legal issues, Compliance and Governance covering Anti Bribery, Competition Law, GDPR, Whistleblowing & other areas.
- Lead roll-out of relevant compliance & governance training to all relevant personnel across different sites / companies.
- Be the lead person in the UK for advice on all aspects of compliance.
Patents / trademarks / Intellectual Property/
- Collaborate with Group Legal in protecting patents, trademarks, and Intellectual property.
- Keep up to date with changes to legal requirements & regulations across multiple areas including, for example, packaging, CSR, Artificial Intelligence, product labelling.
Essential Skills/Experience/Knowledge:
- A law degree or equivalent with a minimum of 2 years’ experience as an in-house counsel.
- Teamwork, high level of emotional Intelligence.
- Excellent organisational skills, attention to detail and a can-do attitude
- Strong written and verbal communication skills with the ability to navigate sensitively through complex matters.
- Ability to work to deadlines, prioritise own workload effectively under pressure, and manage conflicting priorities.
- Familiarity with legal software applications, including document management systems.
Desirable Skills/Experience/Knowledge:
- French language, company secretarial insight, training, matrix reporting, FMCG experience, & experience working in a legal team/department.
The job description is intended to include the broad range of responsibilities and requirements of the post. It is neither exhaustive nor exclusive but while some variations will be expected, these will be at an appropriate level for the role.
If you are interested in applying for this position please forward your CV along with your salary expectations, right to work information and notice period to: careers@lactalis.co.uk
(Please be advised that we can only accept applications from candidates who have the right to work in the UK)