When undertaking a head of legal search, Assura Group was recommended to engage Florit Legal by one of the corporate partners in a commercial law firm in Manchester. Since the company – a real estate investment trust based in the North West – had traditionally outsourced legal work to external lawyers, there was effectively a ‘clean slate’ to design a candidate profile which would suit the company’s core needs for legal advice.
As with most first in-house head of legal search assignments, the challenge can be to define exactly what type of lawyer would benefit the company most. Sometimes, companies misjudge this and end up recruiting the wrong person.
This can be overcome by clients engaging us in early dialogue, to scope out roles, well before they come to market. In other cases, like this, it is more appropriate for one of our law firm contacts to offer their consultancy services, and then to communicate their findings to us and the company, as to the recommended candidate profile. We are then left to advise on an appropriate head of legal search solution and deal direct with the company to fulfil the requirement.
We frequently work with external law firms to scope out the requirements of a head of legal search assignment prior to our involvement and can recommend individuals who are particularly experienced in doing so, regardless of a client’s location.
Following a series of consultations with key stakeholders, a candidate profile emerged for a head of legal search for a candidate with a corporate transactional background, who would join the senior management team, co-ordinate all external legal advice and act as company secretary. The brief required a senior lawyer with in-house experience as well as experience of having acted as a company secretary.
The opportunity was advertised in the main niche legal recruitment media. The advertisement produced a substantial response and this, together with our own head of legal search and networking activities, resulted in a long list of around 90 candidates. These included 2 candidates who were already known to the company, but who were referred to Florit Legal to be independently benchmarked against the shortlist of other candidates we were yet to produce.
Type: Head of Legal and Company Secretary – head of legal search assignment.
Consultation: external legal expertise employed to ‘scope out’ the role and recommend a solution.
Method: Advertised selection + head of legal search.
Appointee: senior in-house corporate/commercial lawyer with previous experience of REIT work.
Location: Warrington, Cheshire.
Florit Legal Recruitment is one of the top specialists in the search and recruitment of in-house legal counsel in the UK. We are among the best legal recruitment agencies for in-house legal jobs, general counsel, company secretary and head of legal appointments, and a reliable source of UK lawyer salary information and executive coaching for lawyers.
