Strategic Legal Business Partner

Company Description

By 2050, the planet could be using twice as much electricity compared to today. Are you interested in contributing and helping to shape the future of the world’s energy? If so, read on.

Fusion, the process that powers the Sun and Stars, is one of the most promising options for generating the cleaner, carbon-free energy that our world badly needs.

UKAEA leads the way in realizing fusion energy, partnering with industry and research for ground-breaking advancements. Our goal is to bring fusion electricity to the grid, supported by tomorrow’s power stations. In pursuit of our mission, UKAEA embraces core values: Innovative, Committed, Trusted, and Collaborative.

As an employee of UKAEA you will benefit from:

• Outstanding defined benefit pension scheme, details of which can be found at the end of this advert.
• Corporate bonus scheme up to 7% and a Relocation allowance (if eligible).
• Flexible working options including family friendly policies and the right to request flexible working from the start of your employment.
• Employee Assistance Programme and trained Mental Health First Aiders,
• Generous annual leave allowance starting with 25 days, plus 3 days Christmas closure and 2.5 privilege days, in addition to UK bank holidays
• Wide range of career development opportunities
• A vibrant culture committed to equality and being fully inclusive

Job Description

The salary for this role is £66,436. Onsite working is expected for 3 days each week, however, we actively support requests for Flexible Working. 

This role can be based at any of the following sites; Rotherham, South Yorkshire or Culham, Oxfordshire, or Whitehaven, Cumbria.

This role requires employees to complete an online Baseline Personnel Security Standard (BPSS), including The Disclosure & Barring Service (DBS) checks for criminal convictions and possibly a search of open source data. 

The Role

Are you looking for an exciting opportunity to make a difference? Join our team and contribute to the future of fusion energy. As Strategic Legal Business Partner, you will play a pivotal role in partnering with directors, managers, legal team colleagues, and external legal advisors to support the increasing need for legal support within programmes and projects. As the delivery of UKAEA’s mission becomes more complex, you will identify legal issues, solve legal problems, and smooth the way for our evolution into an organisation that works closely with a wider group of research and commercial organisations.

You will develop and shape our legal policy and process, helping programmes and teams reach their aims in a legally compliant and efficient way, managing legal risk and providing advice, guidance and training on relevant legal areas. You will also work closely with specialist external legal advisors, ensuring that the advice received is timely, relevant and pragmatic.

Leading for specific Directorates, the Strategic Legal Business Partner will be the first point of contact for Directors, developing an in-depth understanding of programme aims and priorities, as well as being a specialist in your own right on legal issues that UKAEA is likely to need most often.

Key Accountabilities

• Responsible for supporting the Director of Legal and business directors in developing department/programme/business unit legal resource plans aligned to the business priorities and UKAEA mission and goals and ensuring current and future capability requirements are met.
• Act as the strategic Legal lead for assigned departments/programmes/business units, including responsibility for instigating, managing and implementing strategic projects, from scoping and design to delivery and realisation. Projects will cover legal resourcing, defining goals and values, advising on legal structures, risks and options, providing organisation-wide and team-specific training, providing guidance and materials.
• Support the instruction and ongoing relationship with external legal advisors, including identifying needs, advising on selection of experts, liaising with Legal Framework Manager, assisting with procurement and finance process, checking work carried out and monitoring costs.
• Act as the strategic Legal champion, ensuring legal projects receive programme/department/business unit and organisational buy in by influencing UKAEA senior management teams.
• Work with the Heads of Learning and People to develop and promote legal training plans for colleagues, including specialist training adapted to expertise in Finance, Commercial and People directorates.
• Contribute to developing the organisational strategy by ensuring that legal policy and legal requirements are integrated into it, demonstrating a deep understanding of organisation strategy and direction.
• Act as substitute for Strategic Legal Business Partner colleagues in their absence.
• Champion diversity and inclusion in all aspects of the role.
• Deputise for the Director and Deputy Director of Legal as necessary.
• Research, benchmark, pilot, implement, evaluate and review Legal policies, as required.
• Coordinate legal work across the Legal Team where there are common themes or issues, suggesting service improvements, working collaboratively to enable the development and implementation of those improvements.

Qualifications

Essential Requirements:

• Educated to degree level with legal professional qualification (Level 7)
• Professional qualification and registration as a Solicitor or Barrister in England and Wales
• Extensive experience of managing legal business at a strategic level in a complex environment
• Experience of advising in one or more specialist legal areas, including:
• Commercial matters (high-value or complex procurement, joint ventures and collaborations, investment, grant funding)
• Employment (industrial relations, complex casework, policies, equality, agency workers)
• Land and property (redevelopment, leasehold, construction)
• Working within public sector governance, legislative work within Government, non-contentious intellectual property, data protection or nuclear and energy law
• Excellent client skills, including plain English, meeting different learning styles, strong interpersonal and influencing skills, ability to challenge gently but robustly, creative and collaborative in finding solutions.

Additional Information

Please note, there are five vacancies available as part of this advert.

A full list of our benefits can be found here https://careers.ukaea.uk/life-at-ukaea/employee-benefits/. 

We welcome talented people from all backgrounds who want to help us achieve our mission. We encourage applications from under-represented groups, particularly from women in STEM, people from Black British Caribbean and African, Pakistani and Bangladeshi British, and other ethnic minority backgrounds, people with disabilities, and neurotypical individuals. Our Executive team, supported by our ‘Head of Equality, Diversity and Inclusion’ (EDI) and Wellbeing and our EDI Networks actively promote Inclusion and takes steps to increase diversity within our organisation. We reinforce best practices in recruitment and selection and evaluate approaches to remove barriers to success.

Please note that vacancies are generally advertised for 4 weeks but may close earlier if we receive a large number of applications. 

For applicants applying from outside the United Kingdom or those who have spent time outside the UK in the last five years, please visit the following link for information on criminal records checks: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/criminal-records-checks-for-overseas-applicants If your country of residence or previous residence is not listed on the website or if the UK Government does not have information on obtaining a criminal records check from that state, we regret to inform you that we cannot process your application. 

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