Band 7 Senior Legal Officer

Job summary

University Hospitals Birmingham NHS Foundation Trust (UHB) is an incredibly rewarding place to work, offering a working environment with an inclusive culture that looks after and values our people and creates a sense of belonging.

The Legal Services Team is responsible for a portfolio of clinical negligence and public/employer liability claims, Inquests and the provision of healthcare advice. The scope of the work is wide and interesting with the workload being busy making this a challenging but extremely satisfying and rewarding role.

The role offers both management of a mixed and interesting caseload alongside the day to day line management of the legal services team.

The role involves collaboration with both internal and external stakeholders and regular analysis and interpretation of complex information, supporting the team and acting as a first point of contact for healthcare related legal queries that arise.

You will be involved in making positive changes to Trust processes and guidance and in sharing learning and themes from claims and inquests in order to support improvements in quality and patient safety.

Main duties, tasks & skills required

The key aspects of the role include the day to day operational management of the legal team and being responsible for team queries, annual leave, sickness absence, appraisals and any disciplinary processes. You will also manage a mixed case load of complex clinical negligence/employer and public liability claims, Inquests and will be required to provide advice and guidance on Trust policies relevant to claims management, Coronial law and, where appropriate, on healthcare related legal matters escalating as appropriate to the Head of Legal.

You will have a proven track record of line management experience alongside extensive experience of claims/inquest management.

About us

We are recognised as one of the leading NHS Foundation Trusts in the UK. Our vision is to Build Healthier Lives, and we recognise that we need incredible staff to do this.

Our commitment to our staff is to create the best place for them to work, and we are dedicated to:

Investing in the health and wellbeing of our staff, including a commitment of offering flexible working where we can;
Offer our staff a wide variety of training and development opportunities, to support their personal and career development objectives.

UHB is committed to ensuring that our staff are treated fairly and feel that they belong, by creating a kind and inclusive environment. This is about equity of opportunity; removing all barriers, including discrimination and ensuring each individual member of staff reach their true potential, achieve their ambitions and thrive in their work. This is more than words. We are taking action. Our commitment to an inclusive culture is embedded at all levels of the organisation where every voice is heard, driven by our diverse and active staff networks, and at Board level by the Fairness Taskforce led by our CEO. We nurture a culture which empowers staff to challenge discriminatory behaviours and to enable people to bring their 'whole self' to a kinder, more connected and bold place to work.

Job description

*Please Note : For a detailed job description for this vacancy, please see attached Job Description*

Person specification

Qualifications

Essential

• Educated to degree standard with appropriate post graduate level courses or substantial experience at a comparable level Law Degree and/or appropriate qualification

Experience

Essential

• Previous medical negligence/employer liability claims experience
• Previous Coronial/Inquest management experience
• Experience of staff management
• Proven ability to work to tight deadlines
• Able to demonstrate a clear understanding of CPR, the claims process and MHC Rules & Regulations
• Strong technical knowledge in areas relevant to legal healthcare practice
• Good understanding of the principles of investigations management, root cause analysis techniques and Clinical Governance
• Understanding data - extracts, collates, quantitatively analyses and validates data, recognising alternative solution where necessary

Desirable

• Experience of working within or with the NHS in the handling of claims
• Implementing risk and case management systems
• Experience of quality management processes and quality improvement mechanisms

Additional Criteria

Essential

• Strong problem solving ability and capacity to recognise alternative solutions where necessary
• Strong team management and work load management skills
• Ability to interpret national policy and guidance, identify local implications and apply implementation to a local setting
• Critical appraisal of wide ranging documents to facilitate assessment of risk and to ensure appropriate & sensitive communication/management of claims/inquests
• Ability to manage, prioritise and deliver a number of projects and work programmes within timescales
• Ability to work well under pressure
• Ability to devise innovative systems and methods of working with minimal guidance
• Good standard of computer literacy including word processing, spreadsheets and databases
• Competent with gathering, collating and analysing data and information from a variety of sources effectively making recommendations on risk/benefit of actions
• Predicts trends by analysing and interpreting all relevant information
• Strong interpersonal and communication skills
• Written - experience of drafting letters/emails including complex information and technical reports with clarity and awareness
• Ability to prepare written material presenting complex matters in a logical way using the appropriate style, content and language for the audience
• Oral - Communicates with appropriate groups. Information is given correctly and accurately in a helpful and professional manner. Expresses opinions confidently and constructively
• Listening - shows willingness and ability to listen. Absorbs complex messages. Encourages individuals to expand ideas
• Ability to lead and supervise teams and work in a collegiate manner
• Prioritises and plans work of team to meet deadlines and demonstrates an ability to implement decisions
• Displays a high standard of personal integrity
• Actively seeks ways to improve efficiency and effectiveness of own performance and that of team
• Self-motivated, and able to work with minimal management
• Flexible and adaptable to changing Workloads/priorities

Desirable

• Data manipulation including identification, accessing and downloading of data, design set up and development of data entry systems including automation as appropriate

Disclosure and Barring Service Check

This post is subject to the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act (Exceptions Order) 1975 and as such it will be necessary for a submission for Disclosure to be made to the Disclosure and Barring Service (formerly known as CRB) to check for any previous criminal convictions.

Certificate of Sponsorship

Applications from job seekers who require current Skilled worker sponsorship to work in the UK are welcome and will be considered alongside all other applications. For further information visit the UK Visas and Immigration website.

From 6 April 2017, skilled worker applicants, applying for entry clearance into the UK, have had to present a criminal record certificate from each country they have resided continuously or cumulatively for 12 months or more in the past 10 years. Adult dependants (over 18 years old) are also subject to this requirement. Guidance can be found here Criminal records checks for overseas applicants.