Paralegal - Impact Finance

• This is an excellent opportunity for a Paralegal to join our market-leading Impact Finance team, advising banking, finance and impact investing clients including ethical lenders, banks, UK and international impact investors, DFIs, social enterprises and charities.
• The team sits within our top ranked Charity & Social Enterprise department.
• This is a unique opportunity to use your skills and experience to make a real difference. You will have a high degree of client contact, developing your own relationships and networks.

Key Responsibilities

• Legal research and summarising legal documents.
• Provide support to fee earners on the Finance team’s transactional work in the debt finance space which shall include:

• Review, summarise and monitor relevant regulatory updates.
• Support fee earners on matter management where requested.
• Support fee earners in knowledge and business development such as research and preparing documentation and presentations.
• Attend client meetings and produce meeting minutes.
• Play a key role in developing and maintaining the ChaSE Finance team's legal precedents, knowhow and resource bank. Contribute to the creation of new knowhow materials and ensure existing resources are kept up to date and fit for purpose. 
• Participate in team meetings and sector groups, including coordinating meetings and circulating information related to sectors.
• Be proactive in providing high-quality legal service to our clients.
• Display effective time management and career development.
• Attend internal and external training as and when required.
• Keep up to date with developments in law and practice.
• Engage with the firm’s internal forums and programmes.

Skills, Knowledge and Expertise

• You are a graduate with experience as a paralegal and/or a Law Degree, or graduate level legal qualification (such as the Graduate Diploma in Law or equivalent) – a postgraduate level legal qualification such as the Legal Practice Course or the SQE qualifications is desirable for this role, but not essential.
• Ideally, the successful candidate will have a keen interest in Banking, at least one year’s experience supporting banking transactions and experience of organising signings, drafting ancillary documents and managing local counsel and will have excellent project management skills. 
• You have excellent written and verbal communication skills including a focus on attention to detail.
• The ability to build, maintain and nurture relationships.
• A client-centric approach.
• Teamwork – there is a place for individual effort but we highly value a collaborative approach.
• A results-focused mentality – we hope you’ll challenge the status quo if you feel it’ll benefit our work.
• You are an excellent problem solver. You think logically to reach solutions and are not afraid of working in unfamiliar areas. 
• You are proactive and comfortable taking on responsibility to run with your own workstreams where appropriate to do so. 
• You are technically excellent, commercially minded and have great people and project management skills.
• A genuine interest in the work we do; we encourage questions about the business and invite you to test assumptions and propose ideas.

Benefits

About
At Bates Wells, we’re not the average law firm. We believe that actions speak louder than words. We strive to do the right thing as a business and to help our clients make a positive impact on their people and society.Recruitment at Bates Wells – The use of AIAt Bates Wells, we are committed to transparency and fairness in our recruitment processes. We understand the importance of ensuring that our methods align with best practices and respect the privacy and rights of all candidates.We would like to clarify that we do not use artificial intelligence (AI) to screen, sift, score, reject, or approve any recruitment decisions, at any stage of our recruitment process. Our recruitment decisions are made by hiring managers and the HR team, ensuring a personal and thoughtful approach to each candidate.We do utilise AI technology in a limited capacity to enhance our recruitment process. Specifically, we use Metaview to record and transcribe interviews. This tool helps us maintain accurate records of interviews, to support objective scoring of  answers based on evidence and ensures that we can review and reflect on the conversations held during the recruitment process. Importantly, Metaview is not used to evaluate candidates or make any decisions regarding their suitability for a role.We are committed to maintaining the highest standards of privacy and fairness in our recruitment processes and will continue to review and update our practices to ensure compliance with all relevant regulations and guidelines.