Staff Specialist Legal Counsel

Job Description:

Responsibilities

• Primarily responsible for legal advice/consultation and agreements in the following scope of legal topics in India:
• Labour law (including post-merger integration of personnel and compliance-related disciplinary actions)
• Procurement (excluding designated categories of procurement contracts, but including review of and advice on suitability of compliant commercial models)
• Real estate (e.g. leases); and university program engagements (excluding certain categories of university engagements) and corporate social responsibility (“CSR”) agreements.
• May also provide support for the scope of legal topics in 1(a) above for other jurisdictions in the Asia-Pacific region, as assigned. The Asia-Pacific region (“AP region”) comprises Australia, India, South Korea and South-East Asia (Indonesia, Malaysia, Philippines, Singapore, Thailand and Vietnam).
• Provides occasional support in other areas of law such as intellectual property, data protection and corporate secretarial matters in India, or post-mergers integrations/ acquisitions/joint ventures/divestitures in India or the AP region, as assigned.
• Provide legal training in India to relevant business stakeholders on a variety of legal topics.

Qualification & Experience 

• Training/qualifications – qualified lawyer in India, preferably who has passed the All India Bar Examinations (or equivalent professional qualification examinations). Fluency in English (including drafting in English) is required, and fluency in Hindi/Kannada is an advantage.
• Experience – 4-6 years of relevant professional experience (whether in private practice or in-house) advising Global Competency centres/MNCs. Having in-house experience will be an advantage.
• Functional knowledge – Significant and demonstrable understanding/experience of labour law/disciplinary action topics and processes, including principles, concepts, processes and application for/to employees, government agencies, labour audits and post-merger integration labour issues. Working knowledge/experience/understanding in other legal areas (e.g. real estate, commercial contracts, IP, corporate secretarial and litigation) will be an advantage.
• Must have a good understanding of labour/governance legal risks and concerns. Must be able to understand impact of legal risks on business objectives, and advise internal stakeholders on such impact of legal risks on business objectives/needs and strategic decisions. Good legal drafting skills required (drafting of policies/regulations/agreements). Able to handle new or unfamiliar legal questions by analytical thought. Open to learning about unfamiliar topics (whether legal or otherwise) and open to accepting feedback on areas of improvement. Good analytical, client–oriented and communication skills will be an advantage. Commercial acumen and ability to think creatively to provide pragmatic legal solutions to achieve business objectives will be an advantage.
• Work quality – Self-motivated and responsible worker who has initiative. Must be able to organise and prioritise work and respond within deadlines. Can anticipate risks and potential disputes and attempts to resolve them with guidance from manager.
• Must understand/be able to discern when to escalate topics, issues or problems.