Automation Engineer

Licensed sponsor London Full-time Posted 1 hour ago

The Department

Our Technology team continues to go from strength to strength, playing a vital role in firm-wide innovation and strategy. Far from being a support function, Technology is integral to the firm's growth agenda, backed by strong leadership engagement and sustained investment.

The Team

The AI and Engineering team develops practical AI, automation and integration capability for legal practice and business operations. It works closely with Product, Data, Architecture, Security and operational teams to turn valuable ideas into secure, maintainable services, while retaining space for controlled experimentation and rapid learning.

The Role

Reporting to the AI & Innovation Lead, the Automation Engineer designs, builds and supports workflow automation across legal practice and business operations. The role focuses on Power Platform, APIs, integrations and reliable process automation, working alongside the existing low-code engineering capability rather than replacing it.

The role will take prioritised opportunities from process discovery through build, testing, release and support. It will work closely with the Product Manager, Automation & AI Engineer, business process owners, Architecture, Security and platform teams to reduce manual effort without creating fragile or unsupported workflows.

Duties And Responsibilities

Workflow automation delivery

Work against the prioritised AI and innovation roadmap, with the Product Manager accountable for product priorities and outcomes and the AI & Innovation Lead accountable for innovation direction and team capability.
Build workflow automation using Power Automate, Power Apps, Dataverse, APIs, connectors, scripts and other approved services.
Translate process maps and product requirements into clear technical designs, exception paths and testable outcomes.
Integrate enterprise systems securely, using supported interfaces and avoiding unnecessary duplication of data or business logic.
Use AI-assisted software development where it improves speed, while retaining review, testing and accountability for the result.

Engineering and application lifecycle management

Use solutions, environment variables, source control, deployment pipelines and appropriate approval gates to move changes safely between environments.
Apply reusable components and shared patterns, reducing fragile customisation and uncontrolled point solutions.
Create automated tests where practical and complete functional, integration, security and regression testing before release.
Maintain clear technical documentation, release records, support guidance and rollback arrangements.

Service operation and improvement

Monitor flows, integrations, queues and scheduled jobs; investigate failures and reduce repeat incidents.
Design useful alerts, retry behaviour, exception handling and manual fallback for business-critical workflows.
Measure cycle time, failure rate, manual effort and adoption to show whether automation is producing value.
Manage technical debt and platform changes as part of the roadmap rather than leaving them outside delivery priorities.

Collaboration and governance

Work with business teams to simplify the underlying process before automating it.
Work alongside the existing low-code engineer, with this role taking primary responsibility for complex, cross-system and operationally critical automation, while enabling appropriate lower-complexity solutions through shared patterns and governed platform use.
Partner with platform owners and professional developers to choose the right implementation approach.
Apply environment, data-loss-prevention, access, licensing and security standards and escalate unsupported or high-risk designs.

Essential

Skills and Experience

Strong software engineering fundamentals, including version control, testing, code review, documentation and secure development.
Experience working with APIs, integrations, cloud services and event-driven or workflow-based solutions.
Ability to move from an unclear problem to a working prototype, then improve it using evidence and user feedback.
Confidence working with Product, Data, Architecture, Security and business specialists in a multidisciplinary environment.
Clear written and verbal communication, including the ability to explain technical trade-offs to non-technical stakeholders.
A pragmatic approach to experimentation, with good judgement about what is safe to test and what is ready to operate.
Use of approved identity, secrets-management and service-connection patterns, avoiding embedded credentials and unmanaged service accounts.
Commitment to accessible and usable user-facing applications and workflow interfaces.
Strong hands-on experience with Microsoft Power Platform, particularly Power Automate, Power Apps and Dataverse.
Experience building and supporting integrations using APIs, connectors, webhooks, scripts or Azure services.
Understanding of Power Platform environments, solutions, deployment pipelines, security roles and application lifecycle management.
Ability to analyse workflow failure, exception handling and operational support needs, not only build the happy path.
Working knowledge of Python, PowerShell, JavaScript or another scripting language used to extend platform automation and integrations.

Desirable

Experience in legal services, professional services or another regulated, knowledge-intensive environment.
Experience with Azure, Git-based delivery, CI/CD, telemetry and production support.
A strong portfolio of working software, prototypes or automation is more important than a specific degree.
Microsoft Power Platform Developer or Functional Consultant certification, or equivalent practical experience.
Experience with Azure Logic Apps, Functions, Service Bus, SQL or related integration services.
Experience working in a governed fusion-development model with low-code makers and professional engineers.

Please note that this job profile is not an exhaustive list of duties but merely an outline of the key components of the role. You may be required by your line manager to take on additional responsibilities when requested.

About

About Mishcon de Reya Group

The Mishcon de Reya Group is an independent, international professional services business with law at its heart, employing over 1400 people with over 650 lawyers. It includes the law firm Mishcon de Reya LLP and a collection of leading consultancy businesses that complement the firm's legal services.

Mishcon de Reya LLP is based in London, Oxford, Cambridge, Singapore, Hong Kong and UAE. The firm services an international community of clients and provides advice in situations where the constraints of geography often do not apply.The work the firm undertakes is cross-border, multi-jurisdictional and complex, centred around three increasingly entwined and connected sectors: the Innovation Economy, Private Wealth and Capital, and Real Estate. The firm is known as a disputes powerhouse with a formidable capacity firmwide for dispute resolution.

The Mishcon de Reya Group includes consultancy businesses MDR Discover , MDR Mayfair (in London, Singapore and Dubai), MDR ONE , and MDRi (in Hong Kong). The Group also includes MDR Lab , which invests in the most promising early stage legaltech companies as well as the Mishcon Academy, its in-house place of learning and platform for thought leadership.

In 2024, the Group announced its first strategic acquisition in the alternative legal services market, flexible legal resourcing business Flex Legal. It also acquired a majority stake in Somos, a global group actions management business.

We strive to create a fully diverse and inclusive workplace where all our people are empowered to fulfil their potential. We are proud of our agile working culture and are always happy to talk flexible working.