Senior Legal Counsel - Full Time

Summary

Salary: Competitive
Grade: 4
Contract Type: FTC 12 Months
Location: Finsbury Dials, London
Reporting to: Head of Legal Historical Matters Unit
Division: Legal, Compliance & Governance
Closing Date: 14th April 2023

The Purpose of the Role

Post Office is a multi-line business operating in a challenging macro-economic environment. Like all retailers, Post Office must continue to transform if it is to execute its forward-facing strategy. This, coupled with the well-publicised broader issues that Post Office is navigating, requires the Group General Counsel to have a high performing and effective Historical Matters Unit (HMU) to ensure Post Office is able to atone for its past and rebuild trust with Postmasters and customers. The HMU has been formed within Post Office to resolve certain legacy issues facing Post Office in connection with its historic dealings with Postmasters.

The HMU legal team has the overall lead in advising on (and co-ordinating) the legal workstreams within various remediation schemes and legacy issues. These include (but are not limited to) the Historical Shortfall Scheme (a remediation scheme arising from the settlement of the Post Office Group Litigation in 2019), matters connected with criminal convictions, and compensation for historical liabilities. The team will also support Post Office in the submissions it makes on matters connected to the work of HMU to the Public Inquiry chaired by Sir Wyn Williams.

Given the diversity and complexity of the work of HMU, the successful candidate will have substantial legal dispute resolution and/or remediation experience, some of which will ideally have been gained in-house. As a senior lawyer within the team, you will be responsible for identifying and solving strategic and operational legal issues, and providing understandable, accurate and timely advice (often with short deadlines and limited resource) to the business on a wide-ranging and changing set of complex issues, many of which are novel.

A critical part of the role will be to work proactively with stakeholders both within Post Office and Government. The role will also require significant engagement with senior business stakeholders (including at Group Executive, Board and Shareholder level) given the strategic importance to Post Office of HMU work and the significant financial exposures they present.

Principal Accountabilities

• Ensuring the provision of high quality, prompt and pragmatic (industry leading) legal advice and reports to HMU and the wider business, predominantly focused on dispute resolution
• Identifying legal risks, and taking a solutions focused approach to managing and mitigating those risks
• Reporting (verbally and written) as necessary to the Group General Counsel and other senior stakeholders including the Post Office Group Executive and Board
• Instructing and quality assuring the work of external legal advisers, working collaboratively on large matters;
• Working collaboratively across the business with Communications, Compliance, Security, Project Managers, Company Secretariat and Finance.

Qualifications, Experience & Skills

• Qualified to practice in England & Wales with extensive PQE experience as a dispute resolution lawyer
• Excellent communication skills with the ability to synthetise and clearly present complex legal matters and risks for senior and non-legal managers
• Strong interpersonal skills; excellent at relationship building and with the ability quickly to gain the confidence of and influence senior management

• Confident in working with multi-disciplinary teams and able to translate complex legal and compliance requirements into practical workable solutions for the business
• Flexible and adaptable approach with a willingness to provide support where needed
• Demonstrable confidence, initiative and ability to work collaboratively
• Proven ability to work unsupervised with drive and self-motivation and to manage and prioritise multiple contemporaneous workstreams.

About Post Office

The Post Office has thrived at the heart of high streets and local communities across the UK for over 370 years. As one of the country’s most trusted brands, we take our commitment to providing essential services to customers across the UK very seriously. We’re the UK’s largest retail network, as well as the largest financial services provider in the UK, with over 11,600 branches nationwide – more than all of the UK’s banks and building societies put together.

We know that the best way to provide a great service for customers is to evolve our business and adapt to their changing needs. That’s why we have a range of over 170 products and services, from personal financial services like banking, insurance, payments and travel money, to telecoms and, of course, mails. And we’re improving our online and in store experience for customers. We know that our customers never stop changing, so neither will we. We’re here, in person, for the people who rely on us.

Our Ways of Working underpin everything we do, they are the “How” of our business strategy. They differentiate our business and aim to inspire great behaviours and align our colleagues around specific actions in order to be the organisation we want to be, and achieve our business goals.

By living the Ways of Working each day, you will help make that vision a reality and enable our cultural transformation. In short: Working in partnership, as one team, we deliveramazing results!

The Post Office embraces diversity and inclusion in the workplace and actively promote working without discrimination. We are also a Disability Confident Employer and are committed to interviewing disabled people who meet our minimum criteria for the job.