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Travers Smith

Travers Smith is a leading full-service law firm, with a wealth of experience in its areas of specialisation. The firm has a market-leading reputation for its international expertise in Asset Management, M&A and Dispute Resolution & Investigations. Clients include asset managers across the alternative asset classes (private equity, venture, credit, infrastructure and real estate), publicly listed and private companies, financial institutions, and other business enterprises involved in large and complex UK and cross-border matters, transactions and disputes. Our purpose is to provide the highest quality of service to our clients whilst enabling our people to achieve professional fulfilment in a supportive, inclusive and enjoyable working environment.

The Department

We are one of the biggest tax departments in a UK London law firm in relation to firm size (with circa 30 lawyers including 7 partners); this represents approximately 10% of the firm by reference to people and revenues. Our size gives us a breadth of expertise, knowhow and influence which smaller tax departments simply cannot match. We are very highly regarded for advice to private equity, venture, credit, infrastructure, and real estate funds. We are preeminent in private equity transactional tax, advising both financial sponsors and management teams. We also have considerable expertise in tax structuring relating to infrastructure investment, capital markets, finance and real estate. As a result, the variety of work available to our associates is very broad and of high quality.

The approach of businesses to tax influences the corporate governance agenda and is of growing interest in assessing the behaviour of national and international businesses. Our involvement in a variety of industry representative bodies enables us to anticipate developments and help to influence policy to ensure that where possible, new law is clear, effective and well-targeted. For our clients, tax is never a standalone conversation but is integral to every commercial engagement. As such, our Tax team is required to play a vital role in every major corporate and commercial decision faced by our clients and we expect our associates to be able to communicate effectively with internal and external clients to explain the tax issues relevant to their transactions and assist them in finding appropriate solutions. Tax advisory services form a core strength, but we make sure that we think beyond structuring and tackle real-world implementation too. Our lawyers have thorough technical understanding of tax legislation, policy and an awareness of our clients' commercial objectives.

The Tax team operates in a supportive and inclusive way, which aims to allow all members to perform to the best of their abilities and to be themselves at work. We continue to work hard to promote diversity of all descriptions within the team and have already achieved some notable successes in this regard, not least a partner group which is currently around 60% female. We place a value on being good "firm citizens" and we support our associates in taking part in a variety of initiatives at a wider firm level, including D&I, CSR, Graduate Recruitment, and other firmwide business development and management initiatives. We have our own associate social committee which organises a variety of department-focused and cross-departmental events and we have regular offsite and team-building events.

We place a very high value on learning and development for our associates. This is achieved through structured formal training, including weekly whole department meetings and supplementary training for junior associates, and also through our room sharing system, where rooms are shared between a number of lawyers of varying degrees of seniority. Added to this, there is a programme of cross-departmental training which Tax associates can participate in, and regular "milestone training" sessions, aimed at giving associates training in a variety of skills relevant to their level of seniority.

Key Responsibilities

The Senior Associate role in relation to Transactional Tax will include, but is not limited to:

• Advising on a broad range of tax matters including M&A, Finance and Real Estate transactions. With a particular focus and specialism on Real Estate Tax.
• Ability to manage matters and work with light touch supervision.
• Advising on the tax aspects of private M&A transactions (and related transactions and structuring) from the perspective of a variety of stakeholders, including financial sponsors, corporate shareholders, management teams and finance providers.
• Tax advisory work to corporate clients.
• Advice on financing transactions, real estate transactions, restructurings and management equity incentives.
• Tax advisory work on IPOs and other fundraisings and capital market transactions.

The work of the Transactional Tax team frequently crosses over with the work done by the other sub-groups within the Tax team - being the Asset Management and Incentives and Remuneration groups - and our associates will have the opportunity to collaborate with other members of the Tax team in relation to work of this sort, and, where appropriate, to undertake work that crosses over into these areas. There is no requirement for associates to rotate through the different sub-groups, but for those who wish to do so (or who simply wish to gain some experience in these areas whilst remaining in the Transactional Tax team), we can generally facilitate this, subject to business need and other considerations. In addition, there may be opportunities for client or overseas law firm secondments from time to time.

Person Specification - Knowledge, Skills & Experience

• An outstanding academic record.
• UK Qualified Solicitor (preferably with experience at a City law firm).
• Experience in transactional tax (M&A, Finance and Real Estate), commensurate with PQE level.
• Substantive Real Estate Tax experience would be seen as an advantage.
• Evidence of strong verbal and written communication skills.
• An ability to demonstrate proactivity and good transaction management.
• A team player who thrives working within a collegiate environment.
• A willingness to show commitment and engagement to the firm's culture.

This is a transactional role rather than a pure structuring role and candidates would therefore be expected to have experience of and / or an interest in drafting and negotiating transaction terms and documents as well as structuring and advisory work.

The firm would also be open to discussing flexible and agile working arrangements for the right candidate.