Legal Counsel

Responsibilities

• Provide excellent, commercial, pragmatic, risk based and practical legal support and advice to the business
• Draft, review and negotiate simple or complex and high-value legal agreements, including technology contracts in line with DORA and regulatory requirements
• Act as a point of reference on all legal agreements for the company
• Proactively manage the precedent bank of agreements and ensure that they are in compliance with law and regulation and up to date
• Ensure good housekeeping of the Legal drive and maintain administration and record keeping of legal agreements, including maintenance of the spreadsheet of all Legal documentation including current agreements being drafted and all signed agreements
• Deal with legal issues and other technical matters received from the business as assigned
• Carry out training and briefing sessions both internally and externally to develop the knowledge and understanding of legal and commercial contractual issues and provide induction training to new starters and any ad hoc training to the business on legal issues and processes
• Deal with any disputes or other contentious matters, for example, supplier or other third parties, and conduct litigation where required, or instruct external law firms as appropriate
• Manage the trademarks for the First Title group of companies and protect the intellectual property of First Title
• Have an excellent knowledge of data protection laws and ensure that agreements contain the correct provisions to ensure the business remains compliant with the GDPR and data protection laws
• Manage the GDPR framework across group companies and investigate data breaches
• Undertake legal research in various areas such as insurance law ensuring any group companies are kept up to date on relevant areas of law, providing training where appropriate
• Provide management information as and when required to General Counsel and the Board
• Identify and escalation actual and potential legal liability risk appropriately
• Undertake and proactively drive department / FT projects
• Model First Title Values in personal work behaviours, decision making, contributions and interpersonal interactions
• Potential travel throughout UK to be client facing and to build good working relationships
• Provide guidance, advice and direction to Compliance on legal matters affecting Compliance as and when requested
• Keep up to date with relevant legal and marketplace changes and developments
• Maintain continuing professional development as required by the Solicitors Regulation Authority in addition to internal CPD requirements
• Provide company secretarial duties to affiliated companies

• England & Wales qualified solicitor with approximately 3+ years’ post-qualification experience
• Excellent knowledge of contract law and tort law essential
• Knowledge of property law desirable
• Experience with in an insurance or other financial services environment
• Ability to grasp areas of law rapidly and accurately, exercise good judgment and provide robust commercial legal advice
• Commercial and market awareness and ability to think critically
• Strong negotiation skills
• Ability to effectively communicate in all forms at all levels within an organisation
• Strong analytical and problem-solving skills
• Capable of producing high quality work in a flexible, fast-paced environment and at times at short notice
• Takes personal responsibility for actions and decisions and takes initiative
• Ability to organise own time and prioritise workload often within tight timescales whilst still maintaining high attention to detail
• Develops positive relationships with internal stakeholder
• Demonstrates a flexible, adaptable approach and always rises to challenges
• Consistently seeking process improvements and efficiencies

First Title is a pioneer in providing title insurance solutions tailored to the UK real estate market. We specialise in providing robust cost-effective legal indemnity insurance and comprehensive title insurance solutions, tailored to protect property owners, developers, lenders and other stakeholders.

First Title is the UK division of First American Financial Corporation (“FAFC”), a leading global provider…