Head of Legal

Head of Legal

Costello Medical · Cambridge, United Kingdom (Hybrid) · Full-time · Posted 2026-10-21

Salary: GBP 100,000–120,000

Workplace: hybrid

Description

Role Summary

• Responsibilities: You will lead Costello Medical’s global Legal Team, providing pragmatic, commercially focused advice across commercial contracts, compliance, data protection, employment law, risk and governance. You will run the Legal Team as a well-designed, measurable service to the company, build a sustainable team, and give colleagues the clear legal advice they need to make well-informed decisions
• Salary: In the region of £100,000 to £120,000, dependent on experience
• Benefits: Discretionary profit share bonuses paid twice per year, hybrid and flexible working options, generous holiday allowance, private medical insurance, critical illness cover, income protection, full funding for external training, and more
• Role Type: Full-time, permanent role
• Start Date: We have start dates available every month of the year, including December 2026 and throughout 2027. Please state your availability within the application form
• Application Deadlines: Whilst there are no set application deadlines, we strongly recommend applying as early as possible. The role will close when a suitable candidate is found
• Location: This role is available in our Global Headquarters in Cambridge, with opportunities to travel to our other UK offices

About the Role

As Head of Legal and the highest point of legal advice in the organisation, you will lead Costello Medical’s global Legal Team at an important stage in the company’s international growth. You will hold overall responsibility for the team’s performance and development, ensuring that legal support is responsive, proportionate and aligned with our commercial objectives and values.

The role spans commercial contracting, global compliance and data protection, corporate governance, intellectual property, employment law and the legal aspects of enterprise risk. You will combine sound legal judgement with a pragmatic, solution-focused approach, building trusted relationships across the company to understand colleagues’ needs and deliver an excellent service. You will also develop scalable processes, playbooks and training that protect the company while enabling international growth, innovation and new service offerings.

Key responsibilities will include:

• Leading, developing and motivating a high-performing Legal Team, with clear accountability and effective resourcing
• Designing, measuring and optimising the Legal service by clear process design and defined responsibilities, effective collaboration with internal and external partners, measuring the quality of the service and taking a data-driven approach to service improvement
• Overseeing the timely review, drafting, negotiation and lifecycle management of client, supplier and other commercial agreements, including NDAs, MSAs, leases and office fit-out contracts
• Developing and embedding pragmatic contract playbooks, templates, workflows and escalation routes that improve consistency, turnaround times and risk-based decision-making, as well as acting as the key decision-maker for contracting issues outside of playbooks
• Advising senior leaders and the Board on legal risks, regulatory obligations, the legal requirements of good corporate governance, and maintaining clear records and reporting
• Ensuring proportionate global compliance across areas including data protection, privacy, healthcare communications, pharmacovigilance compliance, anti-bribery, competition, employment and emerging AI regulation
• Protecting the company’s intellectual property and overseeing disputes, litigation, regulatory enquiries, insurance matters and other material legal risks
• Supporting international expansion, new entities, partnerships, innovations and service offerings with timely advice on legal structures, local requirements and commercial risk
• Managing external counsel and the Legal Team budget to secure high-quality, cost-effective specialist support
• Building legal capability across the company through accessible guidance, training and self-service tools, while fostering an ethical culture and compliance with contractual commitments
• Supporting with the management of employee incentive schemes
• Alongside our Operations, Finance and External Engagement Directors, building and delivering the Legal Team’s strategy, priorities and service model in alignment with the company’s long-term goals

Hybrid Working Policy: We believe that having face-to-face time in the office holds many benefits and is central to ensuring that the community we have created, where people have a workplace they belong to and feel part of, is never lost. At the same time, we recognise that homeworking can improve work life balance, reduce commuting times and costs, and provide the opportunity to juggle personal commitments.

Therefore, we offer flexible working arrangements that allow our colleagues who have passed probation to work from home up to half their time, measured across a 2-week rolling period.

About Costello Medical

Costello Medical is a rapidly growing, employee-owned global healthcare agency specialising in medical communications, market access, and health economic and outcomes research. We work with a wide range of clients, including the industry’s most successful pharmaceutical and medical technology companies, patient and public health bodies, and charitable organisations. We have been listed in the Top 100 Best Companies to Work For list since 2017, the Boston Globe’s Top Places to Work list in 2025, and were proud to receive B Corporation accreditation in 2022. We are also a certified Disability Confident and menopause friendly workplace. Learn more about us, our work, and our mission on our website: https://www.costellomedical.com/

Requirements

About You

We are looking for a legal leader who combines excellent technical judgement with strong commercial acumen and a practical, solution-oriented approach. You will be comfortable operating across a broad and evolving remit, communicating complex issues clearly and building trusted relationships at every level of the business. You will see Legal as a highly effective advisory service to the wider company.

You will be motivated by new ventures and commercial challenges that you can help enable through pragmatic legal advice. You will take pride in delivering an excellent, innovative service to colleagues, clients and suppliers, while maintaining high ethical standards, appropriate challenge and a clear focus on the company’s best interests.

Essential requirements for the role are:

• A qualified solicitor, barrister or Chartered Legal Executive in England & Wales (oran equivalent qualification in another common law jurisdiction with substantial experience working with English law)
• Around 10 years’ post-qualification experience
• Substantial experience advising on, drafting and negotiating complex commercial contracts, with the judgement to balance legal risk and commercial priorities
• Demonstrable leadership experience, including developing people, managing competing priorities and improving the performance of a legal function
• Strong commercial acumen and a pragmatic, solution-focused approach to enabling business activity without compromising material risk controls
• A broad grounding in the areas of law relevant to our business, such as data protection, intellectual property, employment law, corporate governance, healthcare regulation and AI-related regulation, as well as the judgement to know when and how to seek specialist advice
• Excellent communication and influencing skills, including the ability to explain complex legal matters clearly to non-legal audiences and advise senior stakeholders confidently
• A collaborative approach to processes that span Legal and other teams
• Strong strategic, analytical and organisational skills, with experience designing, measuring and optimising a legal service, including policies, processes, reporting and risk-based escalation mechanisms
• High levels of integrity, tact, discretion and professionalism when handling confidential or sensitive information
• The resilience, adaptability and curiosity to remain abreast of legal, regulatory and industry developments across a broad international remit

Desired requirements for the role are:

• In-house legal experience within a multinational organisation or professional services environment
• Deeper expertise in one or more of the areas of law relevant to our business
• Experience in the pharmaceutical, healthcare, medical communications or life sciences industries
• Experience advising across multiple jurisdictions, particularly the UK, Europe, US and Asia-Pacific region
• Experience supporting international expansion, new entities, partnerships, technology products or new commercial service offerings

The role includes responsibilities across the whole spectrum of legal needs within a multinational professional services business, but we realise that no candidate is likely to have extensive experience or technical knowledge in all these areas. We will, therefore, be interested to hear how and when you would plan to make use of external legal support.

Benefits

What We Offer

Alongside our award-winning company culture, where every team member is celebrated, respected, and has their voice heard, we are proud to offer a comprehensive benefits package that includes:

• A starting salary of £100,000 to £120,000 per annum, depending on your previous experience, as well as a discretionary profit share bonus paid twice per year. Please note that we have established salary bands to ensure a fair and consistent approach for all applicants
• 25 days’ annual leave plus bank and public holidays, as well as a holiday buy and sell scheme
• Flexible working hours and the chance to work from home for up to half of your working time after passing probation
• Flexible benefits scheme offering cash payments, additional pension contributions and more
• Private Medical Insurance which offers comprehensive cover on a “medical history disregard” basis
• Paid study leave and funding for external qualifications
• Critical Illness Cover, Income Protection and Life Assurance
• Paid sabbaticals based on length of service

Learn more about our full reward package and the other benefits of working for Costello Medical: https://www.costellomedical.com/careers/benefits-package-in-the-uk/

The Application Process

You are required to submit your CV and a cover letter via our online application form. In your cover letter, you must explain why you think you would be suited to the role and why you would like to join Costello Medical, with examples to support both. Your CV should clearly state the dates of all qualifications and grades achieved where applicable. If successful in reaching the next stage, you will be asked to attend on-site for a multiple-component interview process.

As an equal opportunity employer, we are committed to fostering a diverse and inclusive workforce and, throughout the recruitment process, there are a number of reasonable adjustments we can provide: https://www.costellomedical.com/reasonable-adjustments/

Please note that, whilst we embrace AI to innovate and improve processes, your role may involve working with confidential data that cannot be uploaded to AI. Therefore, it is important for us to assess your own skills and abilities, so we recommend that you do not rely solely on this technology to generate any application materials.

Visa Sponsorship

We can provide visa sponsorship for eligible candidates for our Head of Legal role. You will be asked to provide details of your right to work in the UK within your application, however this will have no impact on the processing of your application.

Apply

Apply at Costello Medical

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