One of the distinguishing features of the Legal & General in-house team, says group GC Geo rey Timms, is its close involvement in transactional work. Claire Singleton, who handles all the company’s significant M&A deals, has been a particularly important figure. Last year she ran Legal& General’s sale of its Mature Savings unit to Swiss Re, a £650m disposal. ‘Claire was the absolute fulcrum of that deal,’ says Timms. ‘Her involvement was not restricted to the legal aspects of the sale. Right from the genesis to the closure, she was the point person who made it run. That’s what makes her such a great member of the team – she makes the machine work.’ In her role as GC of Legal & General Capital, Singleton oversees the bulk of the company’s real estate portfolio and was closely involved in the acquisition of CALA Homes, the UK’s tenth-largest housebuilder. ‘She is greatly admired by senior colleagues, including [chief executive] Nigel Wilson,’ adds Timms. ‘She has an inner steel but acts in a way that doesn’t alienate people. That is a rare combination of qualities and it helps her take people along with her through the various stages of a project.’ Wilson says Singleton has played a ‘pivotal role’ in transforming the business, adding: ‘She is so good at complex M&A that people have almost forgotten how complicated these transactions are. We used to run bulk purchase annuity deals with an average size of £10m, now it is taken as the norm for us to run a £4bn deal.’