Legal Counsel

About the roleThe successful candidate will act as a business partner, providing strategic, up-to-date, and technically sound legal advice to the Financial Services teams. A key aspect of the job is influencing business decisions and helping teams understand how to design and build products that align with current and future regulatory requirements.

You will provide up to date, technically sound and pragmatic legal advice, ensuring risks are fully understood thereby enhancing confidence in decision making and facilitating good business outcomes.

At a glance

Working pattern / flexible working - This is a hybrid working role, therefore your time will primarily be split between working from home and the London/ Head Office. However, there will also be an expectation to visit other locations as the need arises. 

Our team currently works from the office once a week to connect and on a more ad-hoc basis to attend key meetings, but again the frequency is dependent on the business needs. Otherwise the expectation is that you engage with your stakeholders in the frequency and location that optimises the working relationship, and engagement to successfully enable you to do your role most effectively.

Contract type  - Fixed term contract up to 18 months.

Key responsibilities

• Strategic Collaboration: Act as an essential partner to stakeholders within the Financial Services team, integrating legal expertise into all decision-making processes.

• Influencing Business Strategy: Use your expertise to influence and challenge both day-to-day operations and long-term strategic projects.

• Active Team Contributor: Help foster a successful and efficient legal team by actively contributing to its overall success and well-being.

• Proactive Stakeholder Management: Take ownership of developing and maintaining relationships with stakeholders to ensure the successful delivery of projects and ongoing business activities.

• Commercial Acumen: Apply commercial understanding and strategic insight, and maintain a deep curiosity about the business, its sector, and its commercial pressures.

• Expert Legal Counsel: Provide proactive, solution-oriented legal advice on a wide range of financial services products, adhering to laws, regulations, and company policies.

• Regulatory Expertise: Ensure teams understand current and future regulatory requirements, and challenge procedures to meet them, including Consumer Duty.

• Risk Management: Proactively identify and manage risk by understanding and actively contributing to the company's risk framework and strategy.

• Continuous Improvement: Develop and implement processes and procedures to ensure the consistent and efficient delivery of legal advice, while also identifying and pursuing opportunities for innovation and added value.

• External Resource Management: Efficiently manage external legal support, including law firms and alternative providers, by overseeing outsourcing, reporting, and fee negotiations.

• Collaborative Culture: Drive connections between the legal function and other parts of the organization, fostering a collaborative culture with a shared purpose.

• Resilience and Pragmatism: Be pragmatic and solutions-focused, demonstrating a positive, energetic, and resilient approach to change.

Essential skills/experience you’ll need

• Qualified to practice as a solicitor in the United Kingdom.

• A proven track record of expertise in financial services, especially the credit, insurance or foreign exchange sectors.

Desirable skills/experience you may have

• Experience working as a business partner independently

• Ability to influence stakeholders and have strong interpersonal skills allowing you to work well in a fast paced environment

• Ability to effectively manage commercial relationships with external suppliers (e.g. panel law firms) including procuring legal advice, including agreeing fees and managing the timely and cost effective delivery of work.

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About The Partnership

We’re the largest employee owned business in the UK and home of our cherished brands, John Lewis and Waitrose. We’re not just employees, we’re Partners, driven by our purpose to build a happier world. As we look to our future, there’s never been a more exciting time to join us.  

We’re ruthlessly focused on being brilliant at retail. We continue to innovate, adapt and diversify. Never Knowingly Undersold on price, quality and service in John Lewis and passionately serving food-lovers in Waitrose.   

As Partners we all share the responsibility of ownership and in its rewards. We use our voices to contribute to our success, working together through the good and challenging times, holding true to our behaviours and treating everyone with kindness and respect. 

We all own making the Partnership somewhere we belong. Embracing our differences and creating an environment where we’re free to be ourselves and can THRIVE. Growing ourselves individually, and as a collective. 

As Partners, we make all the difference. And, we all own it.  

Important points to note:  

It’s important to note that some of our roles are subject to pre-employment vetting (which may include DBS checks for successful candidates). If required, you’ll be informed and provided with information about vetting during the recruitment process and we encourage you to complete any vetting documents quickly to avoid delays. Any DBS checks required will be carried out by a third-party registered body and financial probity checks may also be required for some of our roles.  

We also recommend that you apply as soon as possible as vacancies can close early if we see a high number of applicants.  

We want all of our Partners to have a good work-life balance and we support flexible working. This might mean flexible or compressed hours, job sharing or shorter hour contracts, where possible. Please discuss this further with the hiring manager during your interview.