Many larger businesses now employ an in-house Legal Director to advise the company generally – but how do you find a Legal Director with the experience your business needs?  Our guide will help.

To use the title ‘solicitor’ or ‘attorney’ you must have a practising certificate unless you make it clear that you are not “qualified” to act as a solicitor (within the meaning of the Solicitors Act).  However, if you intend to employ someone to manage your in-house legal team, you often won’t need them to hold a practising certificate, provided they have the experience and knowledge to advise your business.  If you are looking for someone to sit in on board meetings, help with governance and generally manage internal legal issues, such as employment law contracts, mergers and acquisitions and so on, someone with good all round corporate law experience generally makes a good hire.

What qualifications should they have?

At the very least an individual should have completed a law degree and have relevant company law experience.

While some fantastic company lawyers never actually went beyond a law degree, most practitioners will have also undertaken either a legal practice course to qualify as a solicitor or bar exams to qualify as a barrister, then completing mandatory pre-qualification work experience.  The exams are challenging, and competition to get onto these courses is so tight that some candidates even undertake BAR prep courses before they even start!   However, straight out of training, they probably won’t have the real world experience or commercial awareness to make them a good Legal Director – therefore work history is more important.  

It’s not a red flag if the applicant does not hold a current practising certificate, this is actually quite common for a solicitor working for a business rather than in legal practice, but you should enquire about CPD since the law changes all the time and your business will rely heavily on their expertise.

What Company Law experience should they have

If hiring for a senior position, they should ideally have held a similar role within a comparable organisation, or have extensive experience (at least 5 years) in private practice specialising in company law.  Ideally their knowledge should be as broad as possible, covering areas such as intellectual property, patents, franchise law, commercial contracts, commercial property and employment law, however it is likely they have specialised to some degree and they are unlikely to be a leading expert in all these areas.  As with any other employee, you should check that their experience tallies with the legal priorities that are most relevant to your business field, for example, a property development firm will have very different legal needs to a software business.

What personal attributes should they have?

The character of your potential employee is as important as for any other position – and more so than in many other legal positions.  The ideal candidate will be a skilled communicator, able to liaise with employees, clients, shareholders and other directors, and will ideally have the skill to explain legal niceties in terms that other board members understand.  Also, given the salary they will command, it is likely they will hold a managerial role and therefore they also need to show the same people management and leadership skills you’d expect to see in your financial director or commercial director.

Remember to hire with diversity in mind

It also goes without saying that when hiring for an in-house legal role, consider your diversity policies and don’t have a set stereotype in mind.  There has been criticism of a lack of diversity in law firms – which to a certain extent will restrict the talent pool who can apply, but things are improving and increasingly, shareholders expect to see a more diverse board.   

In summary

You are ultimately hiring a Legal Director for their knowledge and experience, but you also need someone you can work with.  Hire on ability, aptitude and cultural fit – as you would with any other employee.  You don’t need someone to blow off the opposition in a courtroom – you can instruct an advocate with a practising certificate to do that.  Choose a Legal Director who you trust, who can lead a team and who best fits in with your business objectives.