Job Classification

REQ: 139200

Talent Acquisition Contact: Lerato Sithole

Location: 135 Rivonia Road, Nedbank Head Office, Sandton

Closing Date: 26 May 2025

Job Family

Risk, Audit and Compliance

Career Stream

Legal

Leadership Pipeline

Manage Managers

Job Purpose

• To formulate the Legal Risk Management strategy and set the legal parameters to control; manage and direct the legal function across Nedbank Group to ensure that Competition Law & Regulatory Risk are mitigated.

Job Responsibilities

• Engage with stakeholders strategically to become a trusted operational and tactical advisor within Group Legal (Competition Advisory Portfolio).
• Create a climate of teamwork and enable up skilling of Nedbank legal advisors, improving results for the organization by encouraging cross functional co-operation and by supporting career progression across Cluster legal teams.
• Highlight and escalate legal risks across Nedbank. Build and maintain long term relationships with Cluster Heads and Chief Risk Officers.
• Ensure a relationship of trust is built and maintained and achieve functional objectives.
• Act and respond with authority on competition law risks that impact the industry.
• Ensure adequate budget for delivery of strategy of Group Legal within timelines. Meet changing environment/business needs and targets.
• Ensure delivery of assignments per business parameters by drafting attorney policy for Group Legal (Competition Advisory Portfolio).
• Ensure appropriate risks are reported and escalated and that legal risks across Nedbank are accurately measured and accounted for.
• Track legal fees across Nedbank through accurate reporting to manage legal costs and by ensuring that informed decisions about capacity and outsourcing of Legal work are made.
• Provide legal advice on claims and defence actions, regulatory investigations, complaints or alternative dispute resolution process through application of professional and industry knowledge and expertise, and by ensuring that the best practice advice and opinions are implemented.
• Provide competition law counsel across Nedbank Group by conducting due diligence, attending court hearings, regulatory hearings and briefing attorneys and advocates.
• Establish and maintain a Group Legal (Competition Advisory Portfolio) Centre of Excellence (COE) by building and maintaining a legal opinion database and by reducing costs of outsourcing and managing internal credibility.
• Ensure national legal standards and benchmarks are set by serving on professional bodies.
• Enhance the credibility of Group Legal (Competition Advisory) by providing commercially sound legal counsel to stakeholders and by adequately managing legal risks, while adding value to the business.
• Ensure outcome of decisions gives Nedbank a competitive advantage. Provide oversight over the implementation of Group Legal (Competition Advisory Portfolio) strategy.
• Draft and maintain Competition Law and supporting policies and frameworks. Ensure service excellence by Group Legal (Competition Advisory Portfolio).
• Minimize litigation and dispute risks through ensuring that all decision-making, opinions, documentation and learnings comply with the framework and standards and are captured on system tool.
• Implement in-house counsel barometer benchmarks and metrics by adopting and applying international best practice benchmarks in support of business goals.
• Set and review policy/framework for competition Law attorney panel selection by determining relevant expertise.
• Accountability:
• The Competition Law Specialist is accountable to the Group Chief Legal Counsel.

Minimum Experience Level

• Admitted Attorney with a minimum 10-15 years' commercial legal experience (preferably corporate in-house or commercial law firm.)
• Experience in or exposure to dealing at senior level.
• High level knowledge of corporate and legal operating environments, and a commercially and business minded person operating at a senior level in a business/commercial environment.
• Strong working knowledge of regulatory environments applicable to banking and financial regulation, corporate and commercial law, competition and anti-trust law and data protection and privacy laws.
• Proven experience building and managing large teams with a demonstrable track record of effective performance
• Worked in a law firm or practiced as an advocate.
• Practical financial services experience in working on corporate and commercial law related matters with demonstrated deep specialization in this area of law.
• Ability to apply corporate and commercial law in a banking and/or insurance organization.

Essential Qualification- NQF Level

• Relevant legal degree (e.g. B Proc, LLB)
• Masters and post graduate qualification in law or business (i.e. MBA) is highly advantageous

Essential Certifications