Associate London, England
Job description
Lewis Silkin works with leading businesses to protect and enhance their most important assets - their ideas, their people, their brand and their future. We call it: Ideas. People. Possibilities.
With offices in London, Oxford, Manchester, Cardiff, Belfast, Dublin and Hong Kong, we are recognised by clients and industry alike as being distinct for our unique culture, market-leading practice areas, sector focused approach and for providing solutions to complex, multijurisdictional business challenges, with a pragmatic and human touch. We have two things at our core: people — both ours and our clients’— and a focus on creative, tech and innovative businesses.
Our culture is encapsulated by an ethos of bravery and kindness, guided by our values of Integrity, Clarity, Unity and Excellence (our ‘I-CUE’). We aim to provide a supportive environment for our people, clients and wider community and embrace diversity & inclusion, ensuring people are able to bring their full selves to work.
The Construction team at Lewis Silkin sits primarily within the wider Real Estate practice group but also works closely with the Dispute Resolution practice group. Real Estate is and has always been at the heart of Lewis Silkin and growth of our Real Estate practice, including development and construction, is a core focus at present.
Our specialist Construction team consists of Clare Reddy, Partner, who is based in London heads up the team and deals with non-contentious work, and Owen Williams, a Managing Associate who deals with a mix of contentious and non-contentious work. We draw on support from the wider Real Estate and Dispute Resolution teams as needed.
The Real Estate practice group prides itself on its sector-specific knowledge, specifically in the advertising and media, retail, hospitality and leisure and professional services industries, which are core sector focus areas for the firm.
While the Construction team is small, we constantly punch above our weight advising on high value and high profile developments for a wide range of clients including advising on HQ relocations, major development and infrastructure works and regeneration projects.
Key clients include high profile retailers, hotels, foreign investors, top architects and other design practices and marketing leading contractors and developers.
We are looking for a talented and enthusiastic construction associate to join our construction team. The candidate will be expected to have the experience and confidence to run their own matters under supervision as well as assisting more senior associates and partners with their matters.
The candidate will have an early opportunity to get involved with high quality work and to have direct contact with a variety of clients. The candidate’s workload will be mainly non-contentious construction work with some contentious work and will include both standalone construction work as well as supporting real estate colleagues with development matters and construction aspects of real estate transactions.
Typical work will include:
- Advising on, drafting and negotiating amendments to standard form building contracts such as JCT and NEC including associated collateral warranties/third party rights, performance bonds and parent company guarantees
- Drafting and negotiating bespoke consultant appointments
- Due diligence reviews of collateral warranty/third party rights packages for commercial tenants
- Inputting into construction aspects of agreements for lease for commercial tenants
- Drafting and negotiating commercial fit-out contracts and letters of intent
- Carrying out contract risk reviews for contractor and consultant clients when tendering for or negotiating contracts
- Advising on disputes including with regard to termination of contracts, insolvency, payment disputes, extension of time disputes and defects claims
- Assisting with bringing or defending adjudication proceedings
- Assisting with bringing and defending claims in other forums including court, arbitration and mediation
- Drafting and advising on term maintenance agreements
The role will develop in accordance with the candidate’s own skills, aptitude and preferences and according to the needs of clients and the practice group.
Associates are expected to undertake a significant amount of business development including giving seminars, attending networking events and producing Lewis Silkin branded publications.
Training
The Division’s training programme includes seminars and workshops given by external speakers and by our own internal experts and the successful candidate will be encouraged to attend appropriate external training events.
The successful candidate will be allocated a Career Development Partner (CDP) who will have an overview of their long term career aspirations and progression. We have an excellent track-record of developing our associates and generating opportunities for partnership. Organic growth and a strong team culture is at the heart of our success.
Candidate profile
The successful candidate will ideally have a minimum of 3 to 4 years PQE. However, this does not preclude applications from suitable candidates with more or less PQE.
The ideal candidate must have excellent academics and have gained the benefit of training in a well-respected firm. We are looking for someone with good communication and organisational skills. The candidate must have strong analytical ability, a clear communication style (both spoken and written), excellent client handling skills and, above all, must be a dedicated team player who has a good use of initiative and who also has a sense of fun.
At Lewis Silkin our ethos is simple. We strive to do the best for our clients, our people and the communities in which we operate. We recognise that an inclusive workplace allows for all kinds of ideas and thoughts, a variety of points of view that can trigger discussions or deliver innovative results, and a wide range of versatile skills and expertise. We are proud of the diversity within Lewis Silkin and of our culture that allows people to be themselves at work, ensuring we provide the best possible service to our clients. We are committed to finding the right person for this role and are open to discussing flexible working patterns and office location.
