Case Study - Multinational Leader in Industrial Machinery and Equipment Manufacturing

THE CLIENT

A multinational leader in industrial machinery and equipment manufacturing

The Challenge

After the departure of a key member of their team, our client had a unique opportunity to restructure its contracts function and bring it under the remit of the legal operations. Doing so would result in greater efficiency, transparency and accountability, which our client’s leadership team could rely on to further their U.S.- based objectives.

With established relationships with national governments and corporate clients alike, this opportunity called for a candidate with a niche background covering both government contracts as well as formal legal training within the area of commercial contracts. Combined with a need for this person to work on-site mere months after the global spread of COVID-19, this was a tall order for any in-house recruitment team to fill. Following several candidate rejections, the client contacted Major, Lindsey & Africa for assistance.

The Solution

Interim Legal Talent met with the hiring manager and future supervisor for this role to conduct a needs analysis to identify the ideal candidate profile. The client’s position as a multinational leader in its field made it an attractive company to work for, but a budget-conscious leadership team and on-site working requirement reduced the talent pool. After analyzing the need in detail, it was concluded that the ideal candidate would be someone relatively junior in their career, preferably with formal legal training, looking to establish themselves in a position that offered great potential for upward trajectory to management level.

With the role accurately sketched out, the Interim Legal Talent team began the search for the perfect candidate. Within several weeks, three candidates fitting the client’s ideal profile had been identified and reviewed by the hiring manager. Among these candidates was a former attorney who had recently pivoted her career to contracts management and was looking for an opportunity to assume a greater decision-making role with an established company. This candidate impressed our client to such an extent that they made her an offer mere hours after she had interviewed with them. 

The Results

Opportunities to merge disparate functions within corporate settings to increase efficiency do not happen very frequently. Thanks to a client who was able to identify, and capitalize on, this opportunity, Interim Legal Talent was able to quickly jump in and launch a search for a hard-to-find profile, resulting in a placement in three weeks.

Since joining our client’s team, our candidate has continued to impress their stakeholders through the rejuvenation of the contracts function and has even begun hiring new reports to keep the momentum going.