Head of Legal and Compliance UK and EMEA

For 75 years, Charles River employees have worked together to assist in the discovery, development and safe manufacture of new drug therapies. When you join our family, you will have a significant impact on the health and well-being of people across the globe. Whether your background is in life sciences, finance, IT, sales or another area, your skills will play an important role in the work we perform. In return, we'll help you build a career that you can feel passionate about.

Job Overview

The Head of Legal and Compliance, UK and EMEA will serve as the senior legal and compliance leader for Charles River Laboratories across the United Kingdom and Europe, the Middle East and Africa. Reporting to the Deputy Head of Global Business, this role will provide practical, business-oriented legal and compliance support to regional leadership, commercial and operational teams, and functional partners across a complex, highly regulated multinational environment.

The role requires a UK qualified lawyer with substantial law firm and in-house experience, strong commercial and compliance judgment, and the ability to manage other legal professionals while operating effectively across jurisdictions, cultures, business units, and legal systems. This leader will be expected to balance commercial execution, regulatory expectations, ethical business conduct, enterprise risk management, and Charles River's mission, values, and reputation.

Job Description

Essential Duty / Responsibility

Representative Activities

Estimated Time Allocation

Regional legal leadership and business counseling

Serve as senior Legal and Compliance advisor for the UK and EMEA; support regional leadership, commercial and operational teams; advise on legal risk, governance, regulatory expectations, and business strategy.

25%

Commercial contracting and strategic business support

Lead or oversee support for customer agreements, RFPs, contract negotiations, strategic collaborations, supply arrangements, partnership matters, and other regional commercial priorities.

25%

Compliance, ethics, and risk management

Partner with Global Compliance on program implementation, anti-bribery and anti-corruption, third-party risk, investigations, training, monitoring, controls, risk assessments, and remediation.

20%

People leadership and legal function management

Manage, develop, mentor, and provide direction to legal professionals supporting the UK and EMEA; promote consistency, efficiency, accountability, and practical service delivery.

15%

Cross-functional partnership and outside counsel management

Coordinate with global Legal, Compliance, Finance, HR, Quality, Regulatory, Privacy, Trade Compliance, Procurement, and business teams; manage regional outside counsel and external advisors.

10%

Regional legal and regulatory monitoring

Monitor legal, enforcement, market, and regulatory developments across the UK and EMEA and translate emerging requirements into practical business guidance.

5%

Total

100%

Regional Legal Leadership and Business Support

• Serve as the senior Legal and Compliance representative for the UK and EMEA region, providing practical, timely, and business-oriented advice to regional, commercial, operational, and functional leaders.
• Advise on legal issues affecting business strategy, customer relationships, commercial execution, regulatory compliance, market access, operations, and enterprise risk.
• Partner closely with global Legal and Compliance leaders to ensure alignment with Company standards, policies, risk tolerances, and strategic priorities.
• Monitor legal, regulatory, enforcement, industry, and market developments across the UK and EMEA and translate emerging requirements into practical guidance for the business.

Job Description (cont.)

Commercial Contracting and Strategic Business Matters

• Lead or oversee regional commercial legal support, including customer agreements, requests for proposals, contract interpretation, negotiation strategy, escalation management, template use, and alignment with global contracting standards.
• Provide legal support for complex commercial initiatives, strategic collaborations, customer programs, supply arrangements, procurement-adjacent matters, and other regional business priorities.
• Support M&A diligence, integration, divestitures, partnerships, and other strategic transactions affecting the UK and EMEA region, coordinating with global subject matter experts as needed.
• Help business stakeholders achieve commercial objectives while appropriately managing legal, compliance, operational, financial, and reputational risk.

Compliance, Ethics, and Risk Management

• Partner with the global Compliance function to implement, reinforce, and continuously improve Charles River's ethics and compliance program across the UK and EMEA.
• Provide guidance on anti-bribery and anti-corruption, third-party risk management, government interactions, conflicts of interest, competition law, trade compliance, privacy, investigations, training, monitoring, and other business-integrity matters.
• Support regional compliance risk assessments, mitigation plans, controls, remediation, and reporting in coordination with global Legal, Compliance, Internal Audit, Finance, Human Resources, Quality, Regulatory Affairs, and business stakeholders.
• Promote a culture of integrity, accountability, responsible escalation, and ethical decision-making across the region.

Team Leadership and Cross-Functional Partnership

• Manage, develop, mentor, and provide practical leadership to legal professionals supporting the UK and EMEA region, including direct and indirect reports as assigned.
• Build strong working relationships across Legal, Compliance, commercial, operational, finance, procurement, HR, quality, regulatory, privacy, trade compliance, and other functional teams.
• Promote consistency, efficiency, accountability, and collaboration in legal and compliance service delivery across the region, while preserving appropriate flexibility for local legal and business requirements.
• Manage regional outside counsel and external advisors with a focus on quality, responsiveness, business practicality, cost discipline, and alignment with Company objectives.

Job Qualifications

• UK qualified lawyer in good standing, with authorization to practice law in the United Kingdom.
• At least 12 years of progressive legal experience, including meaningful experience practicing at law firms and in-house with multinational companies.
• Substantial commercial legal experience, including complex contracting, customer-facing business support, negotiation strategy, risk allocation, and support for commercial and operational leadership.
• Strong compliance experience, including anti-bribery and anti-corruption, third-party risk, investigations, training, monitoring, policy implementation, and business ethics in a multinational environment.
• Experience supporting government-facing matters, distributor and third-party relationships, regulatory inspections, import/export matters, data protection, privacy, employment, disputes, and internal investigations.
• Demonstrated experience managing, developing, and mentoring lawyers or other legal professionals.
• Strong understanding of legal and regulatory issues affecting multinational life sciences, pharmaceutical services, biotechnology, CRO/CDMO, research services, manufacturing, or other highly regulated global businesses.
• Excellent drafting, negotiation, analytical, issue-spotting, and problem-solving skills, with the ability to provide clear, practical, and business-oriented legal advice.
• Demonstrated ability to work effectively in a matrixed global organization and influence stakeholders across functions, geographies, cultures, and levels of seniority.
• High integrity, sound judgment, discretion, executive presence, and ability to manage sensitive matters independently while escalating appropriately.

Preferred Qualifications

• Prior experience serving as a regional or country legal lead for the UK, Europe, or broader EMEA region within a U.S.-listed or other global multinational company.
• Experience in life sciences, pharmaceutical services, biotechnology, CRO/CDMO, research services, laboratory services, healthcare, manufacturing, or another regulated global business.
• Experience supporting government-facing matters, distributor and third-party relationships, regulatory inspections, import/export matters, data protection, privacy, employment, disputes, and internal investigations.
• Experience improving legal and compliance processes, templates, playbooks, training, intake models, contract management practices, and scalable service delivery in a regional or global legal function.

Professional Attributes

• Trusted advisor with excellent judgment, integrity, discretion, and credibility with senior leaders.
• Pragmatic, proactive, and solutions-oriented lawyer who understands business objectives and provides clear, actionable guidance.
• Strong commercial acumen and ability to balance legal requirements, regulatory expectations, operational realities, compliance obligations, and business priorities.
• Collaborative, low-ego partner who builds trust across global, regional, and local teams.
• Clear and concise communicator who can distill complex legal and compliance issues for business and functional stakeholders.
• Comfortable operating in a fast-paced, global, highly regulated environment with ambiguity, competing priorities, and sensitive matters.
• Committed to Charles River's mission, values, ethical standards, and reputation for scientific and operational excellence.

Workplace Requirements

The role operates in a general office or remote work environment. Occasional domestic and international travel may be required to support regional business needs, leadership meetings, investigations, transactions, and other Company priorities.

Compensation Data

The hiring range for this position in the United Kingdom is 120,000/yr - 165,000/yr GBP. Please note that salaries vary within the range based on factors including, but not limited to, experience, skills, education, certifications, location and any collective agreements, if applicable. Remote candidates located outside the United Kingdom should be aware that the relevant pay range varies based on country and location.

About Corporate Functions

The Corporate Functions provide operational support across Charles River in areas such as Human Resources, Finance, IT, Legal, Sales, Quality Assurance, Marketing, and Corporate Development. They partner with their colleagues across the company to develop and drive strategies and to set global standards. The functions are essential to providing a bridge between strategic vision and operational readiness, to ensure ongoing functional innovation and capability improvement.

About Charles River

Charles River is an early-stage contract research organization (CRO). We have built upon our foundation of laboratory animal medicine and science to develop a diverse portfolio of discovery and safety assessment services, both Good Laboratory Practice (GLP) and non-GLP, to support clients from target identification through preclinical development. Charles River also provides a suite of products and services to support our clients' clinical laboratory testing needs and manufacturing activities. Utilizing this broad portfolio of products and services enables our clients to create a more flexible drug development model, which reduces their costs, enhances their productivity and effectiveness to increase speed to market.

With over 20,000 employees within 110 facilities in over 20 countries around the globe, we are strategically positioned to coordinate worldwide resources and apply multidisciplinary perspectives in resolving our client's unique challenges. Our client base includes global pharmaceutical companies, biotechnology companies, government agencies and hospitals and academic institutions around the world.

At Charles River, we are passionate about our role in improving the quality of people's lives. Our mission, our excellent science and our strong sense of purpose guide us in all that we do, and we approach each day with the knowledge that our work helps to improve the health and well-being of many across the globe. We have proudly supported the development of 80% of the drugs approved by the FDA in the last five years.

At Charles River Laboratories, we recognize and recruit all talent. We are a company committed to fostering a sense of belonging and work daily in this direction.

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