Deputy Company Secretary

Job Title: Deputy Company Secretary
Salary: Up to £70,000 plus benefits
Hours: 37 hours per week
Location: Walsall

Our client is seeking a Deputy Company Secretary to join their dynamic team to lead governance excellence. Reporting to the General Counsel, you will drive compliance, deliver best-in-class board support, implement innovative policies, and shape corporate governance strategies. This is your chance to play a pivotal role in a forward-thinking organisation, collaborating with leadership and driving impactful change. If you're a detail-driven leader passionate about governance, they want you on board!

About Them

As well as owning two regulated clean Water companies they are a trusted provider of essential services across regulated industries, delivering specialist engineering, asset management, and compliance services to a wide range of clients, including utility companies, local authorities, and organizations with critical infrastructure. With approaching 3000 employees across the UK and further afield, they re committed to upholding the highest standards, ensuring compliance, and supporting our clients infrastructure needs.

The Role

The Deputy Company Secretary will report to the General Counsel and lead the Secretariat function to ensure the provision of best practice company secretarial and governance services in accordance with statutory requirements and service level agreements.

Key responsibilities:

• Ensure the Group's UK subsidiaries and holding companies are compliant with the Companies Act 2006 and all other relevant statutory requirements and that subsidiaries and holding companies in oversees jurisdictions are compliant with the relevant statutory requirements
• Staying up to date with company secretarial, and corporate governance matters, advise the General Counsel on changes in legislation affecting corporate governance
• Drafting and implementing best practice policies and procedures in company secretarial practice and governance
• Delivering technological solutions to improve efficiency, reduce risk and cost
• Deliver best practice company secretarial support for Boards, Committees, Executive Meetings and ad hoc meetings. Provide support to the General Counsel for their group board. Act as the lead support for their Board and its Committees. Ensure the Company Secretarial Assistant delivers support to the UK subsidiary companies

Company secretarial support includes:

• Meeting planning and scheduling, agenda setting and preparation of meeting papers (in conjunction with Executive Assistants), attendance at Board, Committee and ad hoc meetings, maintenance of the forward planners, producing high quality minutes, tracking actions to completion, drafting resolutions
• Ensuring Board and Committee decision making complies with the Group Delegation of Authority Framework
• Ensure that the flow of information and decision making between Boards and Committees is appropriate
• Creating and maintaining electronic statutory records on Sharepoint for all UK Companies
• Ensuring all statutory filings are completed and filed within statutory timeframes
• Managing relationships and liaising with oversees company secretarial teams to ensure that all oversees companies are compliant with the statutory regime in which they operate
• Provide advice on and facilitate compliance with relevant statutory and regulatory company secretariat and governance requirements
• Ensuring terms of reference, reserved matters, forward planners and business compliance policies are communicated, reviewed and updated to reflect internal/external changes
• Managing the conflicts of interest policy, annual updates to conflict declarations and assessing/advising on director conflicts as they arise
• Managing the Director Information Portal in SharePoint
• Manage director appointments and resignations, support director induction, onboarding and training programmes (in conjunction with HR)
• Manage board effectiveness reviews (in conjunction with HR)
• Manage the annual skills matrix review
• Manage the production of the governance sections of the annual report and accounts for UK and oversees companies
• Managing a junior member of the team
• Managing individual company secretarial, governance and corporate projects

Key Relationships:

• Chair, Board and Executive Team
• Group C-Suite and Executive Team
• All subsidiary companies Boards and Executive Teams

What You ll Need

Qualifications: Educated to degree level, ICSA or Chartered Secretary (min ACG) (at least 3 years relevant work experience)

Experience:

• Proven experience in a similar role and ideally in a regulated sector
• Strong knowledge of corporate governance principals
• Experience of building a company secretarial function from the ground up, including implementing appropriate systems and procedures ideally
• Minute taking capability, of a consistent high-quality standard and conducive to serving a regulated entity
• Excellent verbal and written communication skills with the ability to build relationships at Board level.
• High-level attention to detail and accuracy.
• Ability to work independently and collaboratively as part of a team are essential

What You ll Get in Return

• Competitive salary, depending on experience, car/allowance, private medical, matched pension and annual bonus
• The chance to shape the construction legal function and make a lasting impact in a growing organization
• Collaborative, values-driven culture with a focus on professionalism, trust, and community impact
• Opportunities to engage with key leaders, including the CEO, CFO, and other executives
• An environment that supports your professional growth and values innovative, impactful contributions

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