Director, Investigations, Security & Diplomacy

Schillings handles high stakes opportunities and threats for an international clientele: successful individuals, businesses and high-profile organisations across the world. We support our clients to achieve their goals by developing winning strategies to protect their freedom to operate, and are the first port of call in a crisis, defending our clients from attacks on their reputations, privacy and security. Schillings’ offer is unique to the market, combining strategic communications with law, intelligence & investigations, digital resilience and security. Schillings is a collaborative and welcoming place to work, with a positive culture, strong values and a developed service ethic. We require commitment, diligence, curiosity, agility and professionalism, and in return provide competitive packages, stimulating challenges and interesting work. We are committed to sharing learning and creating development opportunities so you can progress your career with us. Our people’s career trajectories and average longevity at Schillings underline this. Join us and become part of our story.

Job Purpose: This role is responsible for leading a high performing team and delivering excellence in client delivery through overall management of the ISD team. It is a hybrid role involving client facing work and team leadership. This role will work closely with the ISD Partners and other Directors, with the remit to lead and deliver:

• High quality client work
• Resource planning: Working with the Resourcing team to maximise utilisation and ensure effective resourcing of matters
• Operational efficiencies and management: Ensuring effective working practices and identifying and addressing operational issues in collaboration with the Head of Fee‑Earning Operations & Resourcing
• Input into annual budget ISD team strategy and plan
• Commercial results: working closely with Finance and partners to ensure the team is performing against financial targets

Role Accountabilities:

• Client Work: Lead the delivery of complex investigations and multidisciplinary advisory matters, working with Partners to shape strategy, manage risk and ensure work is delivered to agreed client, quality, budget and timeline expectations.
• Act as number two to partners and, where appropriate, day‑to‑day client lead, providing clear advice, anticipating client needs and ensuring responsive, high‑quality client communication.
• Build trusted client, Partner and colleague relationships, identifying opportunities to deepen existing mandates or support new client opportunities.
• Take ownership of the commercial and operational performance of matters, including scope, resourcing, fees, profitability, billing discipline and the quality of reports, analysis and advice.

Leadership and management: Work with ISD Partners/CFO to lead and manage the team and to deliver on the agreed targets within the business plan/budget. Work with directors across the business on issues relating to communication, resources and opportunities for cross business collaboration. Overall development and coaching of the team.

People: Working closely with partners and the Talent team, you will:

• Work to deliver resourcing plan for ISD as outlined in budget.
• Work to shape desired culture and sustainably develop the team. This includes encouraging a culture of delivering honest and in the moment feedback.
• Ensure we have the capabilities, skills and experience to deliver excellence for clients and provide meaningful careers.
• Helping people reach their full potential.
• Role model Schillings values and align the ISD team with business’ goals and overarching strategy.

Finance: Manage utilisation levels across team. Work with management team (including CFO/Head of Finance) to assist in delivery of financial targets; managing working capital across the team in line with the business plan targets. Ensuring monthly bills are raised and recovered. Deliver personal targets including fee income, cash collection, chargeable hours and investment hours.

Clients and Markets: Development of client and pipeline management – ensuring key and valued clients are managed effectively. Deliver fee income projections. Identifying early on where there may be shortfalls and developing solutions to address the shortfalls. Pricing – adopting a flexible approach to pricing that matches our charges to the value delivered to the client; working with the CFO/Finance Director, as and when required, to maximise individual client profitability.

Quality and Compliance: Develop quality and excellence within all work undertaken within the ISD team. Ensure that the ISD team maintain a consistent level of quality and consistency in billing and narratives.

Operations: Overseeing working practices, technology and tooling to position the team to deliver a best in class service to clients. Overseeing training and know‑how activities within the team including specialist know‑how and knowledge, internal knowledge sharing, best practice, precedents and external training. It is expected that you will identify and/or work with others in your team to execute this work. Work with Resourcing to ensure capacity/allocation process is smoothly implemented across the firm.

Person Specification: We Are Looking For a Credible, Commercially Astute Director Who Can Act As a Trusted Number Two To The ISD Partners, Lead Complex Client Delivery And Build a High‑performing, Accountable Team. The Successful Candidate Will Bring:

• Experience leading complex client delivery, practice operations or multidisciplinary teams in a high‑stakes advisory environment.
• The credibility and judgement to work closely with Partners and clients, set direction, manage ambiguity and make well‑judged decisions.
• Strong leadership and engagement management skills, including resource allocation, capacity management and delivery against agreed quality, time and budget expectations.
• Excellent critical, strategic and commercial thinking, with the ability to analyse complex issues, challenge assumptions and create practical solutions.
• A clear commitment to client excellence, including high standards of advice, communication, responsiveness and output quality.
• Commercial and financial discipline, including contribution to business planning, budgeting, billing, profitability and investment cases.
• A track record of improving working practices, managing performance and creating clear governance, accountability and follow‑through.
• A proactive, entrepreneurial mindset and the digital confidence to use databases, OSINT tools and AI responsibly, effectively and securely.

Life at Schillings: Given our bold and innovative business strategy, it is not surprising that Schillings has a very strong culture. The atmosphere is highly collaborative and focused on excellence. We have worked hard over the years to develop a coaching culture. Schillings has adopted a set of values to put at the heart of this and they reflect the intention and tenor of our ambitious plans. They are: ‘Innovative; Bold; United; and Excellent’. Our client list speaks for the outstanding results that have been delivered over many years and the task now is to grow without losing any of the commitment to delivering for clients or our service ethos. Finding people who share our values and can thrive in this environment is key to our success. It takes a unique mix of people to create something truly great. We appreciate that diversity of thought, background and culture creates the best environment to truly innovate, solve problems and achieve our goals. We welcome candidates from all backgrounds – if you are driven and want to achieve your best then we will give you the platform and support to succeed.