Paralegal - Professional and Commercial Risk - Newcastle

Job Introduction

Are you looking for a role where you will have an environment where you can enjoy industry-leading work quality without compromising on client contact and business development? Or a position that offers genuine flexibility to allow you to meet your personal and work commitments? We are looking for an additional paralegal to join our busy and highly successful Professional and Commercial Risk team.

We provide expert legal advice to clients across an engaging mix of professional disciplines including Professional Indemnity, Financial Institutions, Directors and Officers, Cyber, Warranty and Indemnity, and Construction. Our teams work collaboratively across these disciplines and, whilst everyone will have their area of particular expertise, we encourage cross-working so colleagues have genuine variety in their work and can use their rounded expertise to provide creative, bespoke solutions for our clients.

We aim to encourage diversity by offering the opportunity to bring your whole self to work, underpinned by our employer brand of A Life That Works. Our team are very busy and work hard, but we offer genuine flexibility to allow you to meet your personal and work commitments – and that flexibility won’t disappear post-Covid. All across our team, from our emerging talent to our senior leadership, you won’t find a closed door, real or virtual. Read on for more information about our specific vacancy and the firm as a whole.

Role Responsibility

As a paralegal, you will play an integral role in the success of our team. You will support the other lawyers in all aspects of the high value work that we deal with for our clients. You will be also given the opportunity to work on some less complicated claims with a greater degree of autonomy, commensurate with your level of experience.

Other specific responsibilities include but are not restricted to:

• Acting as a point of contact for clients, responding to their requests and providing a high level service to clients at all times.
• Legal research.
• Letter drafting and correspondence with third parties.
• Document and bundle preparation. 
• Demonstrating a good level of financial management and accurate time recording.
• Supporting marketing and business development activity and contributing to non-fee-earning activity as appropriate, e.g. knowledge sharing, training, assisting and preparing updates for clients and the team, legal research etc.
• Handling confidential information in line with the firm’s data security protocols.
• The firm, and the team, is committed to nurturing its talent and you will be given all of the requisite support and encouragement to develop your skills while fulfilling the requirements of your role.

The Ideal Candidate

• Experience of working in a target driven commercial environment would be an advantage.
• Excellent commercial awareness and an interest in broader business issues.
• Strong communication skills both written and verbal.
• Ability to deal confidently and professionally with clients and colleagues on day to day issues.
• Excellent organisational skills, able to prioritise and manage tasks within set timeframes.
• Ability to demonstrate a reasonable level of self-sufficiency, combined with an awareness of the boundaries of own competence/authority.
• Change oriented with a positive, flexible approach towards the implementation of new initiatives.
• Team oriented and collegiate with a willingness to share knowledge and support other members of the team.
• Excellent IT skills, to include Word and Outlook.

We have learnt from our pandemic experiences and we now know that with proper communication and collaboration we can make remote work a success. Please have a chat to us about your circumstances and how you would prefer to work. 

We would also welcome an open discussion on how we may be able to help with your legal qualifications. Should you become a member of the team, we are keen to offer support with your personal career growth, however that looks.

About the Company

We are a leading international legal business with over 2,500 colleagues and a diverse range of capabilities. We have 11 offices in the UK as well as offices in Dublin, Madrid, Paris, Singapore, Chile, Colombia, Mexico and Miami. We also have associations/alliances with firms in Malaysia, Brazil, Peru, Argentina, Central America, the USA, Australia and Germany.

We are a broad-based commercial firm with a strong heritage in insurance, health and real estate. This is complemented by a fast-growing Business Advisory capability. We represent a wide range of clients, ranging from household names to government departments and NHS bodies. We act for all of the UK’s top-ten insurers, we are market leaders in the provision of strategic, commercial and regulatory advice to providers and commissioners in the health sector, and in real estate we advise all of the UK’s top-12 housebuilders.

We have an impressive legal pedigree, with 142 Chambers UK 2021 practice area and individual lawyer rankings. In Legal 500 UK 2021, the firm received a top tier ranking for 37 of its practice areas, and 58 DACB lawyers were singled out in the ‘Leading Individual' rankings.

Our successes have been recognised by the legal industry and the markets in which we operate. These accolades include two top prizes in the ‘Excellence in Business Development’ and ‘Excellence in Technology & Innovation’ categories of the 2020 Law Society Excellence Awards – the highest accolade for law firms in England & Wales. Our health sector team won the ‘Crisis Management Team of the Year’ award at the 2020 British Legal Awards for its support to the NHS at the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, and our Cyber & Data Risk team received the ‘Business Development Innovation Award’ at the 2020 Legal Innovation Awards, as well as ‘Cyber Law Firm of the Year’ at the prestigious Insurance Insider Cyber Rankings Awards, for its market-leading suite of digital tools to help our clients prepare for and respond to cyber and data risk crises.

Our vision is to be leading business advisers, recognised for our insight and our outstanding commitment to clients, and for being the place where talented people want to work. For further details on our work and our culture, please visit www.dacbeachcroft.com.

Application Details

At DAC Beachcroft, we don’t just accept your differences we celebrate them.  From bespoke solutions for our clients, to treating you like an individual.  Our strength comes from your diverse ideas and bringing the whole you to work. So if you’re good at what you do, come as you are.  We welcome direct applications and are happy to talk flexible working.

We also want you to be at your very best.  Please feel free to let us know of any changes we can make at any point in the recruitment process that will help support your application.  If this opportunity sounds of interest to you, please make an application and submit your CV.  Your application will be dealt with in the strictest of confidence.

Note for Recruitment Agencies – the DAC Beachcroft recruitment team is responsible for managing all current vacancies through direct hiring and referrals wherever possible.  We do work with recruitment agencies and where we require external support we will formally release those vacancies to the agencies on our Preferred Supplier List deemed best placed to assist us.  Speculative CVs sent by any agency to any DAC Beachcroft employee without a specific request by the recruitment team will not be accepted and with no introduction fee applicable.  Our recruitment team can be contacted at recruitment@dacbeachcroft.com

DAC Beachcroft