Senior Legal Recruitment Manager in London

Milbank LLP has an exciting new opportunity for an established legal recruiter to join us as a Senior Legal Recruitment Manager in our expanding London Recruitment team. The role will oversee various recruitment workstreams (Associate and Special Counsel, Trainee and Business Services with some support for Partner recruitment).

The Team

The London recruitment team consists of the Global Director of Legal Recruiting based in New York, and in London the Senior Recruitment Manager, Graduate Recruitment Manager, Business Services Recruitment Manager, Lateral Recruitment Coordinator, and one or two Recruitment Advisors, supporting the lateral fee-earner, business services and graduate recruitment.

In the wider London HR Group, the team also consists of the Head of HR, Senior HR Manager, Learning & Development Manager, Learning & Development Advisor, Inclusion Manager, HR Assistant and Talent Development Managers.

The Role

To be responsible for managing all London Associate and Special Counsel recruitment, in addition to ad hoc support for Partner recruitment and overseeing the Trainee recruitment process. This role will also oversee the recruitment of business services professionals for the London office. This will involve working closely with all the London Partners, Practice Group Heads, NY Office, Senior Management group, the Graduate Recruitment Partner Committee and Training Principal.

The successful candidate will possess excellent communication and relationship building skills for interactions with cross functional stakeholders.

This is an exciting opportunity for a candidate who enjoys a busy, fast-paced, collegiate working environment and wishes to grow professionally, whilst contributing to delivering an efficient and professional recruitment service to their senior stakeholders, at a growing successful law firm.

Responsibilities

• Partner with the Director of Global Legal Recruiting and other key stakeholders to ensure recruitment goals support the firm’s overall objectives.

• Oversee the entire recruitment lifecycle for lateral fee-earner roles by scoping the recruitment needs with partners; agreeing to an appropriate strategy for vacancies; reviewing candidate details; and coordinating interviews and offers.

• Work closely with practice group partners to identify and meet fee-earner recruitment needs across the London office, as well as managing relevant approvals with New York and ensuring a recruiting license is in place for each role.

• Oversee all aspects of the graduate recruitment lifecycle, including university outreach, internship programs, campus events, assessment centres, and onboarding.

• Make arrangements for any U.S. J.D. Summer Associates who spend time in the London office, including visa preparation and work oversight.

• Work closely with the Graduate Recruitment Committee to identify and meet graduate recruitment needs across the London office, as well as to establish strategy for attracting strong candidates.

• Work closely with the Senior Director – Finance & Administration (UK), the Head of HR and the London Business Services Managers to identify and hire top talent for Business Services Professionals (“BSP”) positions in the London office.

• Ensure a closely monitored and timely approach to managing CV’s and candidates through our new All Hires recruitment portal, flagging any potential clashes of candidate ownership promptly and escalating to the Global Director of Recruiting, or Head of HR for BSP’s, where necessary.

• Ensure that at all points throughout the recruitment process, candidates are tracked, and their status updated on our All Hires recruitment portal, allowing for data analysis on roles where requested.

• Follow up with the relevant internal and external contacts after interviews to ensure that feedback is provided and collated, and any rejection responses are sent in a timely fashion; ensuring that successful / high potential candidates are moved swiftly to the next stage.

• Draft offer letters and contracts of employment for all fee-earner roles, and also oversee the process for Business Services and Graduate recruitment as required.

• Establish and manage strong relationships with key recruitment agencies for fee-earner and BSP recruitment and ensure that appropriate T&Cs are negotiated, signed and in place, prior to commencing any interviews or recruitment for the role.

• Liaise with recruitment agents and working with the team to ensure the timely co-ordination of all interviews.

• Ensure compliance with UK immigration law, working with the Senior HR Manager.

• Be available on occasional evenings, weekends, as may be necessary for recruitment events and providing support to the wider team where needed.

• Manage the London recruitment budget, including preparing the yearly forecast.

• Partner with the marketing team on recruitment advertising/marketing to enhance the firm’s presence in the legal community.

• Ad hoc projects, as required.

Experience & Personal Attributes

• 6-10 years’ experience working in recruitment within a global law firm with at least half of that experience gained at manager level.

• Associate recruitment experience is essential.

• Experience of UK legal graduate recruitment is essential. Exposure to / an understanding of US Campus recruitment is preferred, but not required.

• Bachelor’s degree in law or business discipline is preferred; but not required.

• A recognised CIPD qualification is desirable but not essential.

• Detailed knowledge and understanding of the legal industry as it relates to recruitment and a strong commercial awareness / interest to keep up to date on market trends.

• Strong organisations skills, coupled with an ability to manage multiple roles at once, with a high volume of candidates.

• Able to work well under pressure or short deadlines.

• Strong communicator with interpersonal stakeholder management skills.

• Team player adaptable to fast-paced and changing environment.

About Milbank LLP

Milbank LLP is an elite, international, law firm with over 900 lawyers and 210 partners, based in 12 offices. With over 200 lawyers based permanently in London, it is now the second largest office in the Firm and consists of one of the most talented groups of lawyers of any US law firm in London. We advise on large-scale, high-end, complex matters usually involving multiple jurisdictions across a wide range of legal practice areas including banking & finance, financial restructuring, litigation & arbitration, corporate and private equity.

Driven to deliver exceptional results for our clients, we push boundaries and challenge assumptions. That’s been core to our ethos since our founding in 1866. It fuels how we work and define ourselves, and it informs our growth and evolution as a firm. We keep impressive company. Our clients are market leaders, global innovators and paradigm-shifting entrepreneurs that advance emerging industries. Surrounding ourselves by the best inspires and challenges us constantly to reimagine what’s possible.

Our London office building is among the top 1% of sustainable office buildings in the United Kingdom. It is equipped with the latest technology and communal hubs to support our fully collegiate approach to working.

The Firm reserves the right to vary or amend the duties and responsibilities of the role at any time, in line with the needs of the business.

At Milbank LLP we are committed to treating all our people fairly and with dignity and respect. We recruit and develop our people based on their experience, abilities and qualifications, without regard to age, disability, gender reassignment, marriage/civil partnership, pregnancy/maternity, ethnicity, religion/belief, gender, sexual orientation or socio-economic background.

This role is available on a hybrid working pattern of 3 days a week in the office, and 2 days at home.