Senior Manager: Learning & Development - Professional Skills

Mayer Brown is an international law firm positioned to represent the world’s major corporations, funds, and financial institutions in their most important and complex transactions and disputes. We are recognized by our clients as strategic partners with deep commercial instincts and a commitment to creatively anticipating their needs and delivering excellence in everything we do.

We are a collegial and collaborative firm where highly motivated individuals with an unwavering commitment to excellence receive the opportunity, support, and development they need to grow, thrive, and realise their greatest potential all while supporting the Firm’s client service principles of excellence, strategic partnership, commercial instinct, integrated strengths, innovation, and collaboration across our international firm.

If you enjoy working with team members whose defining characteristics are exceptional client service, initiative, professionalism, responsiveness, and adaptability, you may be the person we are seeking to join our L&D team in our London office as a Senior Manager: Learning and Development - Professional Skills.

The Team:

The L&D team in London is responsible for:

• legal, compliance and professional skills training, for all in the London office
• mentoring and coaching across EMEA and Asia
• skills and compliance training across EMEA and Asia (working with HR teams in local offices)
• global professional skills programmes, (designed and delivered in conjunction with the US L&D team).  

The Role:

You will manage the design, delivery and evaluation of our professional skills offering across London, for lawyers and business services professionals. You will also include EMEA and Asia attendees in our virtual skills programming. Working closely with the Assistant Director of L&D, the Senior Manager: Legal Skills, and senior stakeholders, you will identify capability needs, shape practical solutions aligned to the Firm’s strategic priorities and demonstrate measurable impact. You will be a skilled facilitator and coach in your own right, and may line manage an L&D administrator and/or apprentice from time to time.

Hours:

Standard hours are 9:30am to 5:30pm, with flexibility in accordance with the needs of the business.

Our current working from home policy allows for two days working from home, subject to business need. This policy is subject to change and does not form part of contractual terms

Key responsibilities include:

Management

• Set the professional skills annual curriculum for London, EMEA and Asia, aligned to Firm and practice group / team priorities.
• Manage the professional skills budget and external providers, including the procurement process, ensuring quality and value for money.
• Line manage, coach and develop any direct reports.

Programmes and Projects

• Lead end-to-end design, delivery and evaluation of programmes, including the Business Services Apprentice Programme, Secretarial Team Leader Programme, Junior Management Programme and Mid-level Manager Programme.
• Lead our various graduate recruitment, CSR and community engagement projects including designing and delivering skills programmes for students.
• Co-deliver our biannual Trainee Development Centre, with our Senior Manager: Legal skills.
• Support the global coaching and mentoring programme.
• Manage L&D sponsorship and clawback agreements.
• Monitor the L&D inbox, along with the rest of the L&D team.
• Own the professional skills content on the L&D intranet pages.
• Manage ad hoc projects, as required.

Design, Delivery and Coaching

• Design and personally facilitate professional skills workshops and programmes for lawyers and business services professionals at all levels, including senior audiences, in person, hybrid and virtually.
• Develop blended and digital learning, including short virtual sessions, and e-learning, drawing on current learning, thought leadership, psychology, learning theories, research and practice.
• Innovate how the firm provides learning.
• Coach individuals and teams, and signpost them to further support where appropriate.
• Ensure learning is inclusive, accessible (including for neurodivergent colleagues) and culturally appropriate across offices.
• Carry out L&D inductions.
• Provide return-to-work coaching for colleagues returning from extended leave.
• Keep up to date with L&D, legal sector and learning technology developments, network with peers and pursue your own continuing professional development.

Stakeholder Management and Communications

• Design and implement proactive communication plans to ensure that learning and development initiatives are communicated effectively to target populations.
• Act as a trusted adviser to lawyers and business services professionals, diagnosing development needs and influencing priorities.
• Work with the Senior Manager: Legal Skills to understand the professional skills needs of our lawyers and respond with appropriate programmes
• Work with other teams (such as graduate recruitment, CSR and community engagement) to develop joined-up learning interventions.
• Collaborate with L&D colleagues and maintain strong relationships across the global HR team and across the wider firm.

Evaluation and Reporting

• Evaluate programmes for behaviour change and business impact, not just satisfaction, and use the findings to improve the offering.
• Produce management reports and monthly L&D metrics.
• Ensure L&D activity meets regulatory and professional requirements (including SRA competence expectations) and support L&D administration as needed.

This is a general description of the role and is not exhaustive.

• Educated to degree level or equivalent experience.

Desirable

• Accredited in one or more psychometric tools (e.g. DiSC, MBTI, Hogan).
• A coaching qualification.
• CIPD, or a qualification in learning design, occupational psychology or a related field.

Experience, skills and personal attributes:

• Substantial experience designing, delivering and evaluating professional skills learning, ideally in a law firm or professional services environment.
• Highly skilled facilitator, confident with senior audiences in person, hybrid and virtual, with coaching experience.
• Strong instructional design and project management skills, managing multiple programmes to deadline.
• Experience of evaluating learning for behaviour change and business impact.
• Ability to influence and build credibility with partners and senior business services leaders.
• Excellent attention to detail and ability to follow-through on tasks.
• Excellent written and oral communication skills, with the ability to write persuasively for different audiences.
• Experience with learning management systems and digital learning tools (e.g. Poll Everywhere, Microsoft Forms); knowledge of Micron CE Manager, VinciWorks or AI-enabled learning tools is advantageous.
• AI deployment experience and an understanding of the human skills needed in an AI environment is advantageous.
• Proficient in Microsoft Office (including Excel and PowerPoint) and Teams, Zoom and WebEx.

Personal Attributes

• Genuine interest in and desire to develop others.
• Personable, reliable, with excellent relationship-building skills.
• Proactive and self-motivated, taking ownership of initiatives and outcomes.
• Able to prioritise and work to tight deadlines, both independently and as part of a small team.
• Flexible in terms of design and delivery style, credible and able to tailor presentations to the audience.
• Comfortable with change; constructively challenges existing approaches and proposes alternatives.
• Culturally aware, adaptable and able to work effectively in a global context.
• High levels of integrity, professionalism and discretion.

At Mayer Brown, we are committed to creating an inclusive work environment that offers our people the opportunity and support they need to succeed.

Our culture promotes mutual respect, acceptance, cooperation and productivity among people from all backgrounds and values different perspectives and ideas.

One of our core values at Mayer Brown is to promote inclusion at all levels within the business which is actively supported by our Employee Resource Groups - LGBTQIA+, Fusion (Race & Ethnicity), Multi-faith, Women, Enable (Disability), Social Inclusion and Opportunities Network and Work and Me (Family).

We are happy to discuss any reasonable adjustments that individuals may require throughout the recruitment process and once they have joined the Firm.