Company Secretary

Job Type: Permanent

About Company Secretariat

Company Secretariat is part of Fidelity’s General Counsel team, which services aspects of FIL’s mutual fund, institutional and investment businesses. The role of Fidelity’s Company Secretariat is to provide high quality, value-add professional company secretarial/governance services, which comply with all legal and regulatory requirements, to business partners, FIL corporate entities and managed funds.

The UK Company Secretariat team (“UK Co Sec”), which forms part of a global function, supports the corporate governance arrangements of Fidelity’s UK domiciled entities. Fidelity provides an extensive range of investment and asset management services to retail and institutional clients through a number of regulated subsidiaries and UK Co Sec plays a key role in ensuring that such governance arrangements are appropriate, robust and effectively delivered.

Purpose of your role

We are seeking an experienced Company Secretary to provide high quality, value-add professional company secretarial services, to a portfolio of companies and to contribute to wider departmental projects and initiatives. A key responsibility of the individual will be to support FIL Life Insurance Limited which provides pension products, master trust services and pension administration services to clients within a life assurance wrapper. As a complex PRA and FCA regulated entity, previous knowledge and experience of a life company would be beneficial. Dependent on the candidate, the role could be offered on a part-time basis.

Requirements

These corporate governance-related services must comply with all legal and regulatory requirements and the service proposition of Co Sec can be broken down into the following broad categories

Board liaison and corporate governance advisory – including Board/Board committee composition, evaluation, individual and collective Board suitability assessments, Director induction, Board charters, matters reserved etc

Board, Board committee and shareholder meeting management – end-to-end support of the board/board committee corporate governance process (including agenda planning and setting, Board reporting, minutes)

Director lifecycle management – including appointments, tenure management, succession planning, resignations

Regulatory interpretation, technical advice and guidance – corporate law, regulation and governance, industry best practice

Legal entity corporate administration – maintenance of statutory books and records, statutory and regulatory corporate filings, corporate database management

Projects – corporate actions and restructuring (including change of ownership, mergers, acquisitions, disposals), change of articles, incorporation, business intiatives

Essentially, it is to provide a full complement of company secretarial services to those companies for which the job holder has direct responsibility, either as the primary or secondary professional, and to participate in projects as required.

The role will also involve working closely with other FIL departments in Europe, Asia and Bermuda including legal, compliance, financie, risk, internal audit and product development, as well as external advisers including auditors and legal counsel.

Key Responsibilities

• Provide company secretarial support to the Global CoSec team in respect of FIL Life Insurance Limited and other entities within the FIL group of companies and funds, as may be required.
• Helping deliver tactical and strategic improvements to the day-to-day functions and processes of the Company Secretariat, including improved consistency, efficiency and delivery to agreed KPIs.
• Working closely with other departments and stakeholders to meet and exceed the expectations of the Boards and stakeholders served as well as effectively supporting and implementing Fidelity’s business objectives
• Keeping up to date on all governance-related legislative and regulatory changes affecting UK regulated entiites, and providing advice and support to the Boards to ensure an understanding of the implications for their companies
• Liaison with key third-party service providers
• Oversight responsibility for appropriate Companies House filings
• To have input to any Fidelity-wide projects which impact UK and/or the global Co Sec team and represent the function accordingly

Experience And Qualifications Required

• Fully qualified Company Secretary (experience of a life assurance entity would be beneficial)
• Previous experience of a complex financial services environment
• Confident dealing with senior stakeholders, internally and externally
• Ability to work with a high degree of autonomy whilst being a strong team player
• Demonstrable experience of gaining the confidence of Board members and key stakeholders through a combination of high-quality communication skills and proven delivery capability.
• Strong technical ability and experience to assess and implement the requirements and impact of company law and regulations and changes to both.
• Must be able to demonstrate high standards and integrity.
• Self-starter who is energetic and enthusiastic, with a track record of continuous delivery.
• Willingness and proven ability to implement change
• Can do attitude and pragmatic approach to problem solving
• Ability to manage multiple priorities
• Resilience