JOB DETAILS
JOB BAND: E
CONTRACT TYPE: Permanent - Full-time
LOCATION: Bridgewater House, Bristol. This is a hybrid role and the successful candidate will need to be present in the office (at least 2+ days per week). We are ideally looking for someone to be located in Bristol, or willing to commute.
DEPARTMENT: Natural History Unit - Legal
PROPOSED SALARY RANGE: £80,000-£95,000 depending on relevant skills, knowledge and experience, plus 15% bonus. The expected salary range for this role reflects internal benchmarking and external market insights.
We're happy to discuss flexible working. If you'd like to, please indicate your preference in the application – though there's no obligation to do so now. Flexible working will be part of the discussion at offer stage.
WE ARE BBC STUDIOS
A globally renowned media company borne of the BBC. We make and distribute the world’s most sought-after TV, audio and digital content.
Our ambition is to be the home of the most powerful, entertaining, and inspiring stories for people all around the world.
Why Join Our Team
BBC Studios Natural History Unit (NHU) is the best-known and most loved producer of natural history content in the world, responsible for some of the most globally successful factual content of the past 10 years. The NHU’s programmes have come to represent the gold standard for natural history filmmaking, winning multiple awards and honours.
The NHU’s BBC output includes everything from breath‑taking landmarks (Frozen Planet II; The Green Planet; Seven Worlds, One Planet; Dynasties II; Blue Planet II; Planet Earth II), to returning series and technically challenging live shows (Springwatch; Blue Planet Live) and award‑winning children’s series (Andy’s Safari Adventures). The NHU also has an increasingly diverse portfolio of content that we make for third parties, such as Prehistoric Planet for AppleTV+ Original series, The Americas for NBCU and OceanXplorers, a co‑production with OceanX Media and James Cameron, for National Geographic Disney+.
The NHU is now part of an exciting new Unscripted group within BBC Studios, which also includes the Factual production teams that make Religion, Science, Docs and other specialist Factual programming alongside Entertainment Productions.
PURPOSE OF THE ROLE
We have an exciting opportunity for someone to join the NHU’s Business and Legal Affairs team as Senior Business and Legal Affairs Manager. This role is to be based in Bristol and will be responsible for the provision of business affairs advice and support across the Natural History Unit’s varied and award‑winning slate.
Your Key Responsibilities And Impact
* Negotiate and draft a wide range of complex unscripted production and development agreements, including but not limited to key on‑screen talent, linear/SVOD commissioning, co‑development, co‑production, funding and other rights agreements.
* Anticipate and mitigate legal, financial, reputational and business risk while at the same time offering strategies or alternative ideas to resolve them.
* Be a principal point of contact for the production areas you support, and deliver timely and high quality legal and business affairs advice in order to maximise the opportunity for the business to deliver on its goals.
* Manage a broad workload autonomously, referring upwards as required.
* Propose and deliver structures for complicated rights and commercial deals in unscripted production and development, and understand and implement commercial and business strategies.
* Offer senior support to the Head of Business and Legal Affairs, including deputising when required.
* Provide line management and/or supervision support to the Business Affairs Managers, Executives and Assistants on the array of unscripted production agreements that they work on day‑to‑day.
* Form excellent working relationships with the production teams that you support in order that you become a trusted advisor to those teams who can depend on you for timely and high quality advice.
* Create excellent working relationships with other parts of BBC Studios and BBC Public Service, as well as with key external contacts.
* Demonstrate and champion the BBC Group values, actively fostering a culture built on trust, empowerment, collaboration, creativity, and inclusion.
Essential Criteria: YOUR SKILLS AND EXPERIENCE
* Significant experience in (i) complex drafting and negotiation of a variety of media rights agreements and (ii) advising upon and managing risk.
* Proven interpersonal and communication skills with the ability to work effectively with and advise senior stakeholders.
* Adept at dealing with conflicts and helping to devise solutions where trade‑offs are involved.
* Experience working with media‑related commercial agreements, including media rights agreements.
* Highly business‑oriented operating with a commercial approach.
* Proven experience in line management.
Desired But Not Required
* Qualified lawyer (or similar legal qualification) with an appropriate level of PQE to be able to effectively carry out the job responsibilities.
* Significant knowledge of, and experience in, unscripted television content specifically.
* Experience in negotiating complex unscripted television production agreements, such as commissioning agreements with global streaming platforms and US networks (e.g. Netflix, Apple, Amazon, NBCU) and co‑development/co‑production agreements. In addition, experience of working within the parameters of US union agreements (e.g. SAG) would be favourable.
* Experience in a commercial, global organisation.
* A passion for media is desirable.
Next Steps
We appreciate your interest in this position and understand how important this opportunity is to you. Due to the high volume of interest we may need to close the application period earlier than anticipated. This step is necessary to ensure we can provide a high level of attention and service to all applicants. Thank you for your understanding.
Disclaimer
This job description is a written statement of the essential characteristics of the job, with its principal accountabilities, incorporating a note of the skills, knowledge and experience required for a satisfactory level of performance. This is not intended to be a complete, detailed account of all aspects of the duties involved.
Please note: If you were to be offered this role, the BBC will conduct Employment screening checks which include Reference checks; Eligibility to work checks; and if applicable to the role, Safeguarding and Adverse media/Social media checks. Any offer made is conditional on these checks being satisfactory.
Redeployment
The BBC is committed to redeploying employees seeking suitable alternative employment within the BBC and they will be given priority consideration ahead of other applicants. Priority consideration means for those employees seeking redeployment their application will be considered alongside anyone else at risk of redundancy, prior to any individuals being considered who are not at risk.
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