Recent Job Openings at Shell Petroleum Development Company (SPDC)

Shell Petroleum Development Company (SPDC) is the pioneer and leader of the petroleum industry in Nigeria. We invest heavily in our employees, which is reflected in our industry-leading development programme and our commitment to see our employees’ ideas travel and come to fruition.

We are recruiting to fill the position below:

Job Position: Legal Counsel

Job Requisition ID: R97466
Job Location: Lagos
Employment Type: Full time
Experience Level: Experienced Professionals

The Role

• If you are a curious person, strategic, creative and solution driven thinker with significant experience in managing and advising on complex legal and regulatory issues, then this could be your chance to join a world class organisation and contribute to enable Shell’s strategy and purpose. 
• You will play a role in transforming Shell Legal into a simpler, agile and more affordable function.

Where you fit in

• Shell’s Legal's Strategic intent is to partner with our businesses and functions in the delivery of the organization’s Purpose and Strategy.
• The Upstream Legal team in Nigeria, located in Lagos and Port Harcourt, provides a wide range of integrated legal services to the business and functions with operational excellence, supported by a culture that embeds and sustains differentiated behaviors and networked performance.
• You will be a key member of the Nigerian upstream legal team accountable for providing legal services (excluding litigation management) to all the Shell companies in Nigeria.  

What’s the Role?

• The role of the Legal Counsel (LC) is to provide a wide range of integrated legal advice, support and related services primarily to Shell’s Upstream business in a proactive, timely, cost-efficient and professional manner with a view to furthering business objectives and protecting shareholder interests in collaboration with the business and other functions.
• The LC will report to and work closely with the Managing Counsel, Upstream Nigeria and other senior lawyers to provide support on a wide range of critical operational, commercial & related stakeholder issues and projects, and advice on JV Governance, reputational and regulatory compliance related issues.

More specifically, the role will include:

• supporting the asset teams in the management of all operational and related stakeholder issues to enable operations.
• providing legal support in the management of land acquisition and post- acquisition issues, oil spill compensation and providing legal guidance to the related governance board.
• Supporting the investigation of Health Safety Security and Environmental related incidents across the Shell’s operations in Nigeria, and the Emergency Response team.
• Ensuring documentation is appropriately drafted to accurately reflect agreed legal obligations, and is in line with Shell’s Control Framework and professional standards.
• Supporting compliance issues and, if required, delivering mandatory compliance training to the business (e.g. Anti Bribery & Corruption/Anti Money Laundering, Anti-trust).
• Espousing Shell’s Business Principles and core values honesty, integrity and respect for people at all levels.
• Encouraging and contributing to a team culture of strong performance, collaboration with an enterprise first mindset.

What We Need From You?

• We’re keen to hear from candidates who love challenging work with experience in complex operations, commercial transactions and regulatory compliance issues including drafting and have been called to the Bar as a barrister and solicitor of the Supreme Court of Nigeria for a minimum period of at least 8 years.
• Prior exposure to working with the Energy Industry is highly preferred.

Beyond that, we are looking for a candidate with:

• Demonstrable track record as team player, with strong communication, collaborative, influencing and facilitation skills.
• Ability to think creatively and find pragmatic solutions to legal, commercial and operational issues, within acceptable legal and risk frameworks
• Good commercial mindset and the ability to handle and prioritise multiple demanding clients
• Problem-solving and strategic decision-making skills with demonstrated sound judgment in sensitive areas and on difficult issues
• Familiarity with/experience in dealing with regulatory, commercial transactions and operational issues in the petroleum industry.
• A learner mindset with ability to respond quickly to issues whilst exercising sound legal judgement.
• Ability to develop and build strong relationships with clients with diverse cultural background at all levels and across the organisation and handle complex and sensitive government and partner relations.

Interested and qualified candidates should: Click here to apply online

Job Position: Paralegal

Job Requisition ID: R95310
Job Location: Port Harcourt, Rivers
Employment Type: Full time
Experience Level: Early Careers

What’s the role?
Under the direction and supervision of Legal Counsel:

Coordinate and gather information from requisite Line departments to aid the preparation of pleadings, and other legal documents:

• Locate the information source.
• Liaise with the responsible team.
• Obtain the relevant information/documents including videos and pictures.

Coordinate the gathering of information, materials, documents, reports and evidence necessary to respond to discovery, Interrogatories and pleadings:

• Collate information/documents from relevant Line departments.
• Collate evidence materials for companies’ defense.
• Make necessary photocopies of identifies materials for defense.
• Review materials with in-house Legal Counsel.
• Send copies of agreed materials to external counsel.
• Index and store original copies of materials and make them available when necessary to be tendered in court.

Locating the appropriate witnesses necessary to prosecute or defend a suit in court:

• Locate appropriate witness to defend a suit in court (In-house/third party).
• Make contacts with the appropriate witnesses.
• Provide witness with copies of pleadings filed to aid familiarization on issues in dispute in the suit.
• Schedule pre-trial briefing with in-house & outside counsel.
• Make logistic arrangements for the witness and where necessary accompany witnesses to file depositions and other relevant court processes.
• Support the Team Lead in the Preparation of periodic reports on Litigations for diverse internal and external stakeholders
• Carry out extensive analysis of litigation data to identify patters, trends, and underlying factors for decision making.
• Preparation of presentations for senior business management, CoVs and JV Partners briefings.

Carry out Site visits/Locus checks and summarize findings relevant for prosecuting or defending a claim:

• Provide a report summarizing findings relevant to issues in dispute in a suit.
• Provide reasons why materials/data collated are useful or not useful for the purpose of the litigation.
• Maintain records of materials and data used in Litigation for ease of reference and precedent purposes.

Coordinate the taking of still or video photographs or sound recordings necessary for evidence in court when needed:

• Liaise with the media department to provide video & photographers where necessary.
• Liaise with the media department to provide necessary equipment when needed.
• Collate videos/audio tapes necessary for evidence in court.
• Conduct first line due diligence, including document verification, statistical & documentary research and review these as required.
• Draft correspondences as directed to line clients, external lawyers, witnesses etc. (provided such correspondence does not contain legal opinion or advice).

Court interface:
Management of court administrative interface:

• Visit Court registries and court rooms to make enquiries, obtain hearing dates, submit letters and receive hearing notices.
• Certify and file documents, as required.
• Interface with Litigation Monitoring Contract contractors/personnel for the purpose of obtaining information on ongoing matters.

Interface with court bailiffs and other court officials:

• Accept service of court processes.
• Manage service of court processes on individual staff members.
• Document management

Matter Management System (MMS):

• Update entries in MMS.
• Collate and upload relevant court processes, evidential materials and correspondences in MMS.

Litigation filing/document management:

• Maintain and keep custody of physical case files.
• Maintain secure custody of evidential materials.

Electronic management of litigation records/document:

• Manage electronic filing of litigation documents in the Legal Document management System (LDMS).
• Maintain the integrity of litigation documents in LDMS.

Budget Management Support:

• Support the Legal Counsel in the review of External counsel, Experts and Contractor invoices for processing and payment. Interface with and respond to Vendor’s enquires and complaints in respect of their payments.
• Support the Team Lead and Legal counsel responsible for the annual Litigation budget in the preparation of budget estimates, quarterly performance reviews and assessment of Latest estimates to ensure full cost recovery.
• Provide secretariat support for: diverse projects by the team for de-risking and reduction of the Litigation portfolio; the bi-monthly team meeting; maintenance of sundry Registers on Court monetary deposits, liens, Bank Guarantees etc. and provide quarterly updates to the Finance Team.

Key Experiences and Qualifications

• A University Degree or Higher National Diploma.
• Six years’ work experience.
• Computer literacy and proficiency particularly in Microsoft Excel, and PowerPoint applications.
• Good command of written and spoken English.
• Strong prior experience in Data management and analytics is key.
• Experience as a Litigation clerk or Practice Administrator in a Law firm and/or a diploma in law would be a plus.
• Well-developed report writing and administrative skills.
• Leadership skills, capacity to work independently and as part of a team Ability to build and sustain relationships with the business and external stakeholders.
• Ability to work under pressure, prioritize multiple competing activities and remain positive in challenging circumstances.
• High level of professional integrity
• Result driven self-starter with good business partnering skills and customer focus.

Interested and qualified candidates should: Click here to apply online