Legal Counsel

NatWest Group; Belfast City District; Hybrid; GBP 60,000 - 90,000; Full time

Job summary

NatWest Group is seeking an experienced Legal Counsel to manage and coordinate the delivery of legal advice across Retail, Private Banking & Wealth Management, and Commercial & Institutional. You will work with stakeholders across the bank and externally to ensure timely, effective, and compliant resolutions to products, services, and customer journeys.

The role sits within our Customer Finance Legal Centre of Expertise, with a focus on understanding regulatory issues and leveraging legal

Qualifications

• Experience providing regulatory and commercial advice on transactions and projects.
• In-depth knowledge of general banking law and UK regulatory environment.
• Ability to translate complex legal concepts for non-lawyers.
• Experience working with external law firms and advisers is a plus.

Responsibilities

• Coordinate and deliver legal advice across multiple business areas.
• Manage timelines and stakeholder communications to ensure timely delivery of issues and initiatives.
• Drive cost management through e-billing and other tools; support digital workflows.

Skills

Banking law

Regulatory affairs

Commercial advice

AI in legal

Education

Solicitor qualification

Job description

Join us as a Legal Counsel

• This is an excellent opportunity to join us as a Legal Counsel, where you'll deliver the legal strategy and provide expert, accurate and cost-effective legal advice
• Your role will sit within our Customer Finance Legal Centre of Expertise so we'll need you to have an understanding of associated legal and regulatory issues
• You'll be recognised as a strategic thinker and an expert in your field, gaining exposure to stakeholders across the bank and externally
• In this hybrid role, you'll spend a minimum of two days every week working from your office location

What you'll do

We're looking for an experienced Legal Counsel to manage and coordinate the delivery of legal advice, supporting business areas across the bank including Retail, Private Banking & Wealth Management and Commercial & Institutional. You'll work closely with stakeholders and legal and regulatory colleagues to ensure the timely, effective and efficient delivery of all issues, projects and initiatives related to products, services, customer journeys, digital and transactional matters either directly or through a team.

Additionally, you'll be:

• Making sure that legal advice is readily understandable to non-lawyers, delivered within relevant timescales, and manages and minimises legal and regulatory risks
• Delivering continuous improvement in operating practices and processes, including adopting new ways of working and using legal technology to identify efficiencies, improvements and opportunities to reduce costs
• Providing the communication of internal and external legal advice and helping to deliver transactions and projects to stakeholders in a commercial, user friendly and efficient manner
• Managing legal costs through the use of e-billing, auctions and other cost tools and driving a culture of disciplined cost management and controls

The skills you'll need

To be successful in this role, you'll need experience as a solicitor, providing legal, regulatory and commercial advice in relation to transactions and projects either in-house, or in a leading UK law firm. We'll expect you to have in depth knowledge of general banking law and practice, the UK regulatory environment and the financial services industry, coupled with the ability to establish and maintain strong relationships across the bank.

You'll also need:

• Knowledge of our Retail, Private Banking & Wealth Management and Commercial & Institutional business activities along with the commercial environment within which the bank operates and associated legal and regulatory issues
• Experience of working with leading law firms and other professional advisers and consultants
• The ability to keep up to date with and share relevant legal, regulatory, market and legal technology developments, applying relevant insights to day-to-day practice and delivering legal and regulatory change
• Confidence in using legal technology tools, including AI-assisted research and drafting, document automation, e-billing, matter management and collaboration platforms, and openness to learning and adopting AI-assisted workflows and digital-first service delivery
• The ability to set and achieve high-performance targets and use management information, dashboards and operational data to inform priorities, measure outcomes and drive efficiency