How to hire a general counsel · London or Manchester · general counsel or legal counsel
Hire a general counsel · permanent to fractional
To hire a general counsel, first decide whether you need a legal leader who advises the board and owns the biggest risks, or a lawyer to clear the contract queue.
Then choose the route, check the candidate with their regulator, and test them on one of your own live problems.
We recruit fractional, interim, part-time, temporary and permanent executives, and non-executive directors.
On every brief we send a shortlist of 3–5, each with pay or day rate, availability and IR35 position set out, after five-stage vetting.
How a brief runswhat we undertake
- 01Brief30-MINUTE SCOPING CALLDay 0
- 02Shortlist of 3–5VETTED · RATE BENCHMARK · IR35After the brief
- 03InterviewsYOU MEET THE SHORTLISTYour diary
- 04Scoped startFIRST-MONTH OUTCOMES AGREEDYou set the date
- 05Fractional, interim and permanentIR35 POSITION SET OUTOn every brief
Shortlist3–5
In the press
Law Society Gazette (Ireland) Fractional legal roles grow in appeal – US survey · 28 Sep 2026
Reports a US survey showing fractional legal roles growing in appeal. Useful if you are weighing a part-week general counsel against a permanent hire.
15 minutes · video or phone
Book 15 minutes to hire a general counsel
Tell us the scope and the days a week. We come back with General Counsel candidates, their day rates and availability.
- 0115 minutes, video or phone
- 02We scope the role and the days a week
- 03A shortlist of 3–5 after the call
- 04Fractional, interim and permanent briefs
Pick a day that suits · live availability
On the board · last 3 months
General counsel roles jobs on the board
Current legal leadership roles
How fractional recruitment agencies compare is set out in one place, including how we work: a General Counsel brief and a shortlist of three to five.
01/ the role
Hire a general counsel: the seat before the search
A general counsel is the most senior lawyer in the business.
They advise the CEO and the board, manage outside law firms, and own the legal risks that could stop a deal or bring in a regulator.
Most people who search "hire general counsel" have a trigger in view: a fundraise, an acquisition, a regulator, a dispute or outside legal bills that keep climbing.
Name the trigger in the brief, because it decides which candidate fits.
What the regulator expects of the seat
If your general counsel is a solicitor, the Solicitors Regulation Authority will ask the most senior solicitor in your organisation to account to it for the legal work there.
Their professional duties, including independence, sit alongside their duties to you as an employer.
If they also join the board, the seven general duties of a company director come with the seat.
The Bar Standards Board’s guidance for in-house barristers notes that a director’s duty can sit at odds with professional duties, so some lawyers prefer to advise from just below board level.
02/ scope
How to hire a general counsel: the steps
Here is how to hire a general counsel in five steps, whichever route you choose.
1. Name the legal risk the seat must own
Write down the work the GC must take on in the first year, the outside firms they will manage and the budget they will control.
Then say whether they will report to the CEO and sit on the board, or act as company secretary.
2. Decide whether you need a leader or a lawyer
If the gap is contract volume rather than judgement at board level, the hire is legal counsel, not a GC.
The section on that choice below sets out the difference.
3. Choose the route
Permanent, interim, fractional or part-time: the table below sets out which fits which situation.
Decide before you set the budget, because the cost basis differs.
4. Check practising status
The SRA’s guidance on when a solicitor needs a practising certificate says one is needed by anyone held out as a solicitor, and by anyone carrying out reserved legal activities.
Check the name on the SRA’s Solicitors Register, and a barrister on the Barristers’ Register.
5. Test the work, then take references
Give each candidate one of your own contracts or a live risk, and ask how they would handle it and what they would escalate to the board.
Take references yourself from a CEO or chair who relied on their advice.
Acas notes there is no set recruitment process in law, but employers must follow a fair one, with discrimination and data protection law applying throughout.
What we do on a general counsel brief
We send a shortlist of 3–5, each with pay or day rate, availability and IR35 position set out.
Every candidate goes through our five-stage vetting first.
03/ comparison
Permanent, interim or fractional?
Three ways to fill the top legal seat. Choose by how much of the week the legal work fills, and for how long.
04/ vetting
How we vet general counsel
What we undertake on every brief, before a candidate reaches you.
- 01
Qualification screen
Verify General Counsel tenure, sector context and stage fit.
SOURCING - 02
Mandate fit
Match to your situation — stage, board dynamics, timing.
MATCHING - 03
Reference deep-dive
We take references ourselves, from recent past clients — real outcomes, not titles.
VERIFY - 04
Shortlist
Three to five candidates with day rate, availability and IR35 position set out.
SHORTLIST OF 3–5
05/ hire a general counsel in London or Manchester
Hire a general counsel in London or Manchester: what changes
To hire a general counsel in London or Manchester, you run the same five steps.
What changes is the pool you search and the pay band you benchmark against.
A search for "hire general counsel London" turns up a deep market of in-house lawyers and private-practice partners.
The work is narrowing it to people who have handled your kind of risk in a business of your size.
A search for "hire general counsel Manchester" reaches a smaller pool, so widen it on purpose.
Include candidates who would commute in for agreed office days, and those open to a fractional or interim arrangement.
The regulator does not change with the city: a solicitor of England and Wales is regulated by the SRA wherever they work.
Salary surveys publish separate London and regional bands, so benchmark against the city you are hiring in.
Agree in the brief which days are in the office and which are remote.
The general counsel jobs on our board show how other businesses are framing the seat.
06/ general counsel or legal counsel
General counsel or legal counsel: which hire
General counsel or legal counsel is a choice between a leader and a practitioner.
A general counsel sets legal strategy, advises the board and decides when to call in outside firms.
A legal counsel drafts and negotiates contracts, gives day-to-day advice and usually reports to a general counsel or head of legal.
Hiring a GC to clear a contract backlog wastes the seat; hiring legal counsel to face a regulator leaves the board without an owner for the risk.
A first in-house lawyer is often the second kind, with a GC brought in later.
For part of the week, fractional legal counsel covers the practitioner work, and fractional lawyer jobs show how those roles are framed.
Whichever you choose, check what they can do in-house.
The Legal Services Act 2007 reserves six activities, including the conduct of litigation and rights of audience, to authorised lawyers.
An in-house barrister employed by a business that is not a regulated law firm may advise only that employer and, in limited cases, closely connected third parties, according to the Bar Standards Board.
07/ every route
Choosing the route: permanent, interim or part-week
Robert Half’s 2026 salary guide puts a general counsel at £127,000 to £173,250, with a median of £145,500.
For a permanent search in full, see general counsel recruitment, and general counsel salary for pay and day rates.
An interim general counsel covers the seat full-time for a fixed term.
If the need is a lawyer for one transaction or dispute (the search people type as "hire an interim lawyer"), say so in the brief, because it may not need a GC at all.
A fractional general counsel works agreed days a week.
To go that way, hire a fractional general counsel.
A lawyer working through their own company may fall under the off-payroll working rules (IR35).
Status depends on how the engagement runs, and a medium or large client makes the determination; our IR35 guide sets out the tests.
08/ questions
Hire a general counsel FAQ
The questions people ask before bringing in a general counsel.
Book 15 minutes · shortlist of 3–5
Bring the brief. We architect the team.
A shortlist of 3–5 with day rate, availability and IR35 position set out, after five-stage vetting.
