About

Julie-Ann McCaffrey began her role as head of legal at MHI Modern Homes Ireland (MHI) in 2018 in Ballyjamesduff, County Cavan, Ireland. Prior to MHI, she worked at one of the largest commercial law firms in Belfast and specialised in contentious construction and EU public procurement. During this time, McCaffrey won numerous awards for services to the promotion of mediation including the CEDR Tony Curtis award for a “Young Professional” and was recognised by the Professional Mediators’ Association in London. She is also a dual-accredited mediator certified by both the ADR Group (UK) and International Academy of Dispute Resolution (Chicago). She was recognised by The Legal 500 as a “Next Generation Lawyer” in autumn 2018, and is a former chair of the Northern Ireland Young Solicitors’ Association (2016) and vice-president of the European Young Bar Association (2016); an organisation representing over 200,000 lawyers. As part of her term as chair of the NIYSA, she successfully bid to host the European Young Bar Association Spring Conference in Belfast and secured Netflix’s “Making a Murderer” lawyer, Jerry Buting, as keynote speaker. She is also a current member of the Future of the Profession Group of the Law Society of Northern Ireland. Upon joining MHI, McCaffrey set up the in-house legal function from scratch and significantly reduced the external legal costs. She also orchestrated the legal management of the company’s minority share sale to BAM. She highlights that ‘it has been refreshing to see how my legal advice has had a direct impact on the business. It has been professionally beneficial to work with colleagues who are skilled and experienced in their own fields in order to fully understand the needs of the business. I have set-up the legal department and encouraged a collaborative approach so that all areas of the company see the benefits of legal input’. In the words of a nominator who has worked with her, ‘McCaffrey has at all times shown great leadership, commercial abilities and strong legal skills. McCaffrey and her team members have a wide range of complementary skills and expertise which they consistently put into use, from coordinating due diligence processes to managing all commercial contracts and associated issues. She has shown herself to be highly committed and hardworking, full of energy with enthusiasm for all tasks and is available at all times as required’.