Senior Legal Officer (Employment)

Edinburgh, 35 hours, Permanent

Salary range per annum: £66,909 to £75,492*

There is more to the RCN than you might think. We’re a trade union with a membership of over half a million nurses, midwives, nursing support workers and students. We support their practice, represent them, lobby on their behalf, and develop them. We exist to make a positive difference – to the working lives of our members and ultimately to standards in patient care. Our employees are drawn from many walks of life – we are nurses, marketers and communicators, administrators, IT professionals, policy and finance experts, lawyers… together we are so much more. We couldn’t do what we do without our people.

We're accredited with Investors in People Silver Standard. Our people are our greatest asset, and we want people who can contribute to our purpose in line with our values.

As a Senior Legal Officer (Employment) you will work alongside the in-house Legal Employment Team, Legal Management Team and RCN colleagues in Scotland to lead and develop the day-to-day provision of RCN Legal Services to members in Scotland, staff and others.

This is an exciting opportunity to lead and line manage a newly established multi-disciplinary Legal Team in Scotland supervising their development and casework; and be the primary point of contact for Employment Relations Colleagues in Scotland. You’ll use your commitment to trade union membership and your knowledge of employment law to deliver legal advice and representation to RCN members as you conduct your busy caseload. Every day will be filled with possibilities as you deal with a wide range of requests for your legal opinion and advice.

To join us you will need to demonstrate extensive experience in conducting an employment law caseload and experience of Fatal Accident Inquiries. You will need to be able to effectively lead a team and manage their workload. Your ability to develop and maintain strong professional relationships and encourage close collaboration between departments will be at the heart of this role.

Whatever your background, you'll be efficient, accurate and show a real customer focus in all you do.

To succeed at the Royal College of Nursing all you need to do is think bigger, better and brighter. And with an attitude like that, anything’s possible.

What we offer you

We expect you to look after our members. And we expect you to be rewarded for it. We offer an impressive range of benefits, a broad range of learning development opportunities and an award-winning health and wellbeing programme. We offer annual leave up to 32 days plus bank holidays and three additional days for the Christmas break plus generous maternity, adoption, paternity, and shared parental leave packages.

*We offer a competitive pay structure with annual pay progression until you reach the top of the salary scale. We normally offer new employees the first point of the salary range, although you may be able to negotiate a higher starting salary depending on your skills, experience and current salary.

We are a diverse organisation and understand everyone has different needs and many of our employees enjoy flexible working enabling them to deliver results whilst having a good work life balance. Our hybrid working model allows for up to 60% of your working time to be carried out from home. At least 40% of your working time will be spent working in person.

Our selection process

Please click the ‘apply now’ button to submit a CV and answer the supporting questions online demonstrating how you meet the criteria for this role. You may not be shortlisted if you don’t. Please ensure your CV is in a simple format with minimal tables and sections. Any identifying information in your application will automatically be anonymised for shortlisting purposes.

We want your experience applying for a job with us to be the best it can be. We may hold our interviews and assessments in person or by video call. If you foresee any problems, please let us know.

Equal opportunities for everyone

Equity, diversity and inclusion are a priority for us and we aim to foster an inclusive environment so our people can bring their authentic selves to work. This is integral to our mission to enable you to support our members and ensure their voice is heard by all UK governments to get the best outcomes for them and their patients.

As proud member of the Disability Confident employer scheme we actively encourage applications from people with disabilities.

Opening date: 05 September 2024

Closing date: 11.59pm on 26 September 2024

If we receive many applications after a week of advertising, we may close this vacancy earlier.

Selection dates:

1st stage Assessment centre: 09 October 2024 (Scotland HQ)

2nd stage interview date: 23 October 2024 (Scotland HQ)

Interview date: 23/10/2024

Contracted hours: 35