Legal & External Affairs Counsel - Operation at British American Tobacco

Job Number: 9928BR
Appointment type: Permanent

Job Purpose and Key Deliverables
Principal legal and external affairs counsel responsible for legal and external affairs matters relating to Operations and other functional units including strategic business projects, Legal Compliance, Risk Management, Compliance with laws (e.g., operations related laws) engagements on tobacco regulations, excise management, Government & General Operations related engagements, Supply Chain, Contract & Commercial risk advice, operations employment law policies and compliance, interpreting operations related regulations, EHS. (OPS).

The role provides the following:

• Strategic legal advisory on functional projects, initiatives and Business-As-Usual (BAU)
• Advise and assistance on legal rights and obligations arising from the Company’s relationships with group companies and third parties
• Compliance with group’s Standard of Business Conduct
• Commercial advisory and transaction structuring
• Legal risk management
• Contract management
• Business Continuity Management
• Dispute resolution and dispute avoidance
• Policy drafting, corporate governance and compliance advisory
• Disciplinary procedure management
• Strategic business management
• Strategic project management

Key Accountabilities
Operations /HR / Professional/ Business:
The Focus of this role is to drive the legal and external affairs agenda for the operations arm of the business located in Ibadan.

Other functions are:

• Act as the principal legal business partner and advisor to Operations, HR Supply Chain, Finance and functional units in Ibadan.
• Act as the Business Continuity Management (BCM) Facilitator for LEX Function
• Proactively manages and drives regional legal and external affairs specific projects as determined from time to time by the business thereby mitigating risks and enhancing the overall level of governance within the business.

Management:

• Responsible for the development and execution of the public relations, regulatory engagement and internal communications support for the West African business unit of British American Tobacco .
• Responsible for triple bottom line reputation management and facilitation of employee engagement necessary for the Operations function .
• Manage day-to-day legal service delivery by the LEX function, with particular emphasis on Operations, HR, Other functions in Ibadan & identified strategic projects
• Member, WAA Operations Leadership Team
• Provide management support to the Operations related functions to achieve business objectives and avoid, mitigate and manage legal risks, a applicable.
• Participate actively in the management and execution of identified business projects.
• Identify and secure external resources where necessary to ensure that legal requirements pertaining to Operations and related functions are met in the most efficient and cost effective way.
• Manage regulatory affairs arising in relation to Operations and related functions.
• Preparation of legal documentation e.g contracts, leases etc to support business transactions and initiatives.
• Maintain and oversight on the review of the functions BCP document using the BCM manual as a guide and creating awareness of the BCM activities within the function.
• Management and coordination of BCM activity inputs at functional meetings and team talks.

Leadership:

• Active participation in key business meetings, including: Business Strategy Review (BSR) meetings, Product Development Team (PDT) meetings, WAA and Nigeria Lex team meetings, HR Leadership Team meetings and Operations Leadership Team meetings.
• Support, implement and achieve the strategic plans and objectives of the lex functions as determined by thebusiness.

Desirable Requirements

A Graduate and Qualified lawyer who is fluent in English with 10-15 years legal experience as a practice lawyer in a commercial law firm and/or as an in-house counsel; with cognate experience in corporate and commercial transactions, employment law, dispute resolution and regulatory affairs management.Legal skills must be complemented by related management skills / business knowledge to:

• Handle the complete range of business issues
• Assess and respond to priorities
• Inspire sufficient confidence in management / contribute to the realisation of business objectives.
• Highly developed business and people management skills.
• A sound commercial awareness and practical approach
• Good commercial judgment; ability to understand the aims of the BAT business;
• Advanced communication skills, including excellent writing skills and the ability to create and present power point presentations to top management
• Effective negotiation skills
• High degree of self-motivation and initiative
• Ability to work well as a member of a multi-disciplinary and multi-dimensional team.