Legal Counsel

Position Summary

The Legal Services portfolio at St. Joseph’s Health System (SJHS) is expanding and is excited to be recruiting for a 4–6-year call, full-time, permanent legal counsel.

As Ontario’s most comprehensive healthcare system, and the only one in the province to provide care from pre-birth to end of life, St. Joseph’s Health System offers the right candidate with the opportunity to join a community of committed innovators, leaders and healthcare providers in advancing our vision of Unstoppable Compassion. With a diverse and sophisticated client base spanning acute academic health sciences, long term care. home and community care, palliative, mental health and addictions and research lines of business, you can explore opportunities to deepen your substantive expertise in the healthcare sector, cultivate professional excellence, and stretch yourself as a trusted legal advisor across multiple specialties at St. Joseph’s Health System.

The role reports to the General Counsel, Chief Legal, Risk and Privacy Officer. This position is based in a hybrid work environment, with flexibility to work remotely approximately 75% of the time.

This role focuses to a significant degree on negotiating and drafting contracts that are outside the ambit of the procurement team. To succeed in this role, the candidate should have strong familiarity with drafting a variety of contracts and the insight to identify and assess the need to mitigate risk. The role requires strong familiarity with the health care sector. The right candidate will be able to navigate and understand the myriad ways in which non-profits innovate, collaborate, share data, govern co-operatively and partner, in order to get things done. The role will work with clinical/operations, digital solutions, research, education and medical affairs teams to understand their needs and concerns when negotiating and drafting agreements. The ability to deliver results in a timely manner and with a practical eye on risk-benefit ratio is important.

Familiarity with corporate law in the non-profit sector would be valuable. Experience in the healthcare sector would be particularly helpful.

Other responsibilities include providing general advice to directors and managers across the various SJHS entities, on a variety of issues, drafting and advising on policies for the legal, risk and privacy teams, occasional research and educational presentations to staff or management teams to explain complex areas of law, supporting the General Counsel with a variety of legal tasks.

What We are Looking For

•Law Degree (LLB) from a recognized law school

•Member in good standing with the Law Society of Ontario

•Minimum 4-6 years of related legal experience

•Working experience in the healthcare sector or corporate law an asset

•Experience negotiating, drafting and providing risk advice for a variety of contracts

•Experience providing practical legal advice, informed by research and risk assessments

•Knowledge of law applicable to the healthcare sector, corporate law (not for profits and charities) and privacy law an asset

•Familiarity with the Fixing Long-Term Care Act and legal/compliance issues in post-acute care settings an asset

•Excellent analytic skills and ability to write clearly and concisely

•Ability to provide practical, timely advice tailored to operational needs (versus long, complex memos)

•Demonstrated initiative, independent thinking, conflict resolution and creative problem-solving skills

•Effective collaboration and teamwork

•Demonstrated professionalism and tact

•Ability to work independently, without constant supervision

•Superior communication skills – written, verbal, presentation

•High level of integrity and trust