Pinsent Masons has upped the salaries of its newly qualified (NQ) lawyers in London, the regions and Scotland.
The international outfit confirmed that NQs in the City will now receive a salary of £72,500 a year, up £2,500 (or 4%) from a previous rate of £70,000. Legal Cheek’s Firms Most List shows Pinsent’s London lot have leapfrogged the likes of Eversheds Sutherland (£72,000), K&L Gates (£71,000), Taylor Wessing (£71,000) and Addleshaw Goddard (£70,000), and now sit just behind their peers at Squire Patton Boggs (£73,000) and Stephenson Harwood (£73,000).
The firm, which offers around 71 training contracts each year, has also bumped pay outside London. NQs in the regions will now earn £44,000, up £1,000 (or 2%) from £43,000, while those in Scotland will receive a salary of £43,500, up £3,500 (or 9%) from a previous rate of £40,000.
While trainee pay in England remains unchanged, the firm’s rookies north of the border now earn £24,000 in year one, rising to £27,000 in year two — uplifts of £1,000 (or 4%) across the board.
News of the rises come just a week after Clifford Chance confirmed it had followed Freshfields’ lead and upped NQ pay to £100,000, in what has been described by some as an attempt to bridge the pay gap between the magic circle and top paying US outfit’s in the City. It is, however, worth noting that unlike its Anglo-German counterpart, Clifford Chance’s new six-figure salary includes a discretionary bonus.
Legal sector continuing to grow despite Brexit, according to research
The average annual earnings of partners at UK law firms exceeded £200,000 for the first time last year, new research has revealed.
Average partner pay hit £201,000 last year, an uplift of 7% on the previous year’s figure of £187,000 and 35% on £149,000 in 2012.
The boost in partner earnings is partly down to the continued growth of the UK legal sector which has been less affected by Brexit than originally feared, according to accountancy firm Hazlewoods. It also cited a hesitancy by firms to create too many new partners along with an increase in automation and outsourcing of basic legal work for the bump in partner pay.
The findings also show UK partners were unsurprisingly hit in the pocket following the financial crash, with average earnings dropping from £172,000 in 2008/9 to £149,000 in 2011/12.
“UK law firms learned a lot of lessons from the last recession. They run much tighter ships and are more efficient at converting hours worked into bills which are paid. Expensive new office overheads are taken on with more care and diversification efforts that fail aren’t allowed to run at a loss for too long.”
Legal Cheek‘s Firms Most List shows partners across the magic circle can earn well in excess of the £200,000 average.
In 2018, Freshfields posted a profit per equity partner (PEP) of £1.7 million, while Linklaters, Allen & Overy and Clifford Chance all reported figures of between £1.5 and £1.65 million. The remaining magic circle firm, Slaughter and May, does not disclose its results, but it is understood to be the most profitable of the elite fivesome.
Lawyers from across the country poured into the capital yesterday afternoon for this year’s London Legal Walk.
Judges, barristers, solicitors, students, apprentices, clerks and journalists were among the 15,000 walkers raising cash for free legal advice charities and pro bono agencies across London and the South East.
Leaving from Law Society’s Chancery Lane HQ, walkers were treated to a scenic route of London’s gems: passing the river Thames, Hyde Park, Buckingham Palace, Trafalgar Square and the Royal Courts on the way.
Of those taking part in the 10k walkathon was legal legend, Lady Hale, president of the Supreme Court, who donned a sash celebrating the first 100 years of women in law.
Also joining was Attorney General, Geoffrey Cox QC MP, and Solicitor General, Lucy Frazer QC MP, who were backed up by the rest of the Attorney General’s office.
We did it. The 10k legal walk raised approaching £1 million for legal charities; thanks to the fine team from the AGO who kept the SG and me going! pic.twitter.com/WozQBaD1NH
… while other determined walkers appeared to come straight from the office.
Some of us from Treasury Legal Advisers joined the Government Legal Department team for the London Legal Walk this evening. Here are some of us at the end of the walk. Good to see many other legal friends during the walk including @robertpowell09@SusannaMcGibbon@Geoffrey_Coxpic.twitter.com/c008wGHIzh
Upon reaching the finishing line back at Chancery Lane, walkers were rewarded with a refreshing bevvy, a range of street food and an upbeat samba band.
The celebration catered for all participants, as shown by Hardwicke’s joint head of chambers, PJ Kirby, and his four-legged friend who made use of the dog bar.
A trainee solicitor has been fined and reprimanded by a judge after she admitted to spitting at a bouncer during a drunken tirade.
Twenty-nine-year-old Scottish rookie Carly MacDonough was at a bar in Glasgow last July when door staff ejected one of her friends, Gavin Savage. Unhappy, the Evening Times reports that Savage called security staff “fat b******s” before “raging” MacDonough “spat towards one of them”.
The pair, who had earlier in the day attended a music festival in the city, attempted to book a cab home as bar staff called the police. They were arrested but were “initially too drunk to be charged”, according to the report.
Savage claimed he was having “banter” with a fellow customer before a disagreement broke out.
The duo, both from Cumbernauld, were each fined £350 after they admitted to acting in an aggressive manner — a fine reduced from £400 on account of their guilty pleas.
“She [MacDonough] knows this is a threat to her career prospects. She is a trainee solicitor and has been part of the same firm in different capacities for the past 10 years.”
Criticising the pair’s behaviour, Sheriff Gerard Bonnar told them: “This kind of behaviour in the city centre gives an appalling impression of the city and both of you should be ashamed.”
Ryan Beckwith previously argued charges were beyond regulator’s remit
A partner in Freshfields‘ London office who is alleged to have abused his position to engage in sexual activity with a junior colleague will face a full disciplinary hearing after failing in his bid to have proceedings thrown out.
Ryan Beckwith, a restructuring and insolvency specialist, reportedly “kissed or attempted to kiss” the unnamed member of staff in a London pub in May 2016, the Law Society Gazette reports. This occurred when Beckwith, who is married, was in a position of authority, according to the Solicitors Regulation Authority (SRA).
The regulator also alleges that Beckwith “initiated and/or engaged in sexual activity” with the same “intoxicated” junior colleague just weeks later, the website reports, and that the magic circle partner should have known his “conduct was unwelcome”.
Beckwith had attempted to have the proceedings thrown out, arguing through his barrister, Alisdair Williamson QC of Three Raymond Buildings, that the charges were beyond the remit of the regulator and that proceedings amounted to an abuse of process. He also alleged that the complainant had acted dishonestly and colluded with another witness.
Speaking at the case management hearing yesterday, Williamson reportedly told the tribunal:
“It is inherently unfair you are not in the position to properly assess the process the witness went through. The case should also stop as you have no basis to prefer [the unnamed complainant’s] later account that she was too drunk to consent and didn’t consent. This is a matter for regulatory consideration over the earlier account, which is that this was a mutual mistake.”
However, dismissing Williamson’s arguments, tribunal chair Nicola Luckin said there was enough evidence for a case to be answered, telling those gathered at the hearing that “we do not think it is the case that the evidence is so imperfect that it is beyond redemption”.
Beckwith, who has been placed on indefinite leave, studied law at Anglia Polytechnic University (now Anglia Ruskin University), before going on to study civil law at the University of Oxford. He made partner in 2012.
Speaking back in April when the accusations against Beckwith first emerged, a spokesperson for Freshfields said:
“We are aware of the publication regarding a hearing before the Solicitors Disciplinary Tribunal involving a partner at the firm, who is on indefinite leave. The matter is subject to proceedings and we are unable to comment further.”
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Legal Cheek Careers meets employment solicitor-turned ULaw Bloomsbury campus dean, Sandie Gaines, to discuss her career journey to date and application tips for summer training contract success
Sandie Gaines
Sandie Gaines had a busy and broad employment practice. In any one week she could find herself delving deep into complex claims, relaying difficult points of law to several clients on the go, engaging in business development initiatives or turning her attention to the urgent twists and turns of a case. When matters turned litigious, she would carefully draft advocacy on behalf of clients for hearings in the Employment Tribunal. “My work was very varied — often I wouldn’t know what issues would arise on any given day,” reflects Gaines, who is now the dean of The University of Law’s (ULaw) London Bloomsbury campus.
Gaines’ legal aspirations began during her gap year before university when she decided she was going to pursue law. “I always knew I wanted to be a solicitor so studying law at undergraduate level seemed like the obvious route for me,” she says. An LLB at the University of Hull followed in which she secured a training contract offer in her first year. That was with a relatively small general practice in Faversham, Kent, which Gaines then joined shortly after completing the Legal Practice Course at ULaw (the College of Law as it was back then).
Gaines subsequently moved to a two-partner firm specialising in criminal law in Gillingham, Kent. Like many law students, Gaines admits she found criminal law “exciting” but soon realised it wasn’t for her. It was at this point she began to look further afield, casting her net wide to potential new challenges. This came in the form of employment law.
She recalls being told by various recruiters at the time that to switch practice areas post-qualification was an “impossible” pursuit. But Gaines didn’t back down: “Being told you can’t do something is strangely motivating,” she quips, and so she spent the next six months “in transition”. She completed a short course to “reskill”, reached out to colleagues for advice and leveraged the skills she picked up while practising in criminal law (namely court advocacy which she says helps with employment litigation) to land an associate role covering contentious and non-contentious work at a South East firm with a large employment law arm.
Her journey into employment law was, she admits, fairly unusual, and casting her mind back to her first-year self she probably “wouldn’t have gone straight into criminal law”. She continues: “I was offered a training contract in my first year shortly after completing a summer job there and went straight for it. Upon reflection I would say I should have had more self-confidence and not taken the first opportunity that came my way and considered broader options than the one I took.”
For readers who may be in a similar position to Gaines — that is wanting to switch practice areas — her advice would be to carefully plan and research around your target practice area but to also be “realistic”. “It’s important to set out a framework: think about the skills and knowledge you have, the ones you will require and how you are going to bridge that gap. Make sure to give yourself a long lead time to do so then consider how you will convince a recruiter about your change in direction,” she adds.
From then on Gaines continued to specialise in employment law at large regional outfits. Latterly she worked as an associate at multinational law firm Squire Patton Boggs (or Hammonds as it was then before its transatlantic tie-in) in its Manchester office.
“I’ve worked at almost every type of law firm (excluding in-house). It’s important to have a breadth of experience of the different types of firms that are out there but do so strategically. There was a pattern to my career development. It’s possible to move too often which can look erratic — so make sure you have a pathway and a clear career goal ahead,” she advises.
Gaines’ next goal was teaching. She left Hammonds and began at ULaw Manchester in the summer of 2009, first as a lecturer in business and contract law before progressing to operations manager, academic manager and later the campus dean. She transferred to the London Bloomsbury campus two and a half years ago. “London has always been an incredibly buoyant and diverse market. I did experience the Manchester legal market picking up pace considerably — there are lots of large firms setting up offices in the North West which is a great source of work for students,” she notes.
Aside from managerial duties, a large focus for Gaines as the campus dean of ULaw Bloomsbury is student employability.
She counts the ability to synthesise and analyse complex information and laws (there’s often always some overlap with other areas of law) as skills that make a good employment lawyer. Being able to successfully communicate with and handle clients who may be going through troubling times is another essential in every employment lawyer’s toolkit, alongside advocacy as well as negotiation since the vast majority of employment cases reach an out of court settlement.
Gaines will be speaking during Thursday’s ‘Secrets to Success London’ event at ULaw Bloomsbury, alongside panellists from Dechert, Ropes & Gray and Wiggin. There she will shed further insights on her career journey and offer advice to student attendees from her many years in practice. For now, she leaves budding employment lawyers with these snippets of advice:
“It’s about demonstrating a tangible interest in employment law and taking every opportunity you can to learn more about the discipline. If you’re working in a related area: what have you done to pursue your interest? Have you considered the transferable skills and how these apply in the context of employment law? It’s essential to match your previous experience with that which is required of an employment lawyer.”
Keeping abreast of employment law developments doesn’t go amiss either. Have an understanding of the impact of the scrapping of employment tribunal fees and the monumental rise of the gig economy courtesy of disruptors like Uber and Deliveroo.
When faced with rejection, Gaines advises this: “If the rejection was after interview always request feedback. Take the time to reflect and extract the learning points. Try not to be put off by it — instead see it as a source of information.”
Signatories commit to supporting women into top lawyer roles
A trio of representative bodies have launched a pledge to help support and progress gender equality within the legal profession.
Law firms, chambers and other organisations who sign the pledge will commit to publishing gender equality targets and reporting on their progress towards achieving them. Moreover, signatories will support the progression of women into senior roles in the profession by “focusing on retention and promotion opportunities”.
The Women in Law pledge is launched today by the Law Society, Bar Council and Chartered Institute of Legal Executives (CILEx) at an international symposium on gender equality.
“As a profession which strives to uphold justice, the legal profession must be at the forefront of the fight for gender equality and diversity in the workplace,” said Law Society president Christina Blacklaws. “In signing the Women in Law pledge, legal organisations across the country will hold themselves accountable for gender equality in their workforce and commit to creating a more diverse profession.”
Throwing his support behind today’s commitment, Justice Secretary David Gauke said:
“We know that a more balanced workforce is good for business and the wellbeing of organisations… It is only by working together that we will improve equality and diversity and I encourage all law firms and others to sign the pledge and ensure there is equal opportunity at all levels.”
In April, Blacklaws called on male lawyers to play a greater role in tackling gender imbalance across the upper echelons of the profession. Speaking in an interview with The Guardian newspaper, she said: “We need men to step up and take responsibility… they are a key part of the solution.”
Ex-Labour council candidate Aman Thakar appeared on BBC’s Tory leadership debate
Aman Thakar
A junior lawyer at well-known human rights outfit Leigh Day has apologised after a “sarcastic” tweet about Hitler blew up yesterday.
Aman Thakar, an employment lawyer, was mocking far-right activists who had apparently defended the Nazi leader’s nationalism. But the tweet in isolation was picked up by the right-wing press to attack the Labour-supporting lawyer, who has been suspended from his job.
The fuss began when Thakar appeared on the BBC’s Conservative leadership debate earlier this week to ask a question of the candidates. Political news website Guido Fawkes discovered that he worked for the Labour party and had stood as a Labour council candidate.
Screenshot of Aman Thakar’s tweet
The website, which has been promoting Boris Johnson’s candidacy, then discovered a February 2019 tweet from Thakar’s account saying: “Hitler’s abuse of the term nationalism is, to me a nationalist, the most harmful part of his legacy”.
The tweet was prompted by prominent figures on the American far right apparently defending the nationalist instincts of Nazi leader Adolf Hitler. Thakar, by contrast, was mocking that stance in his own ironic tweet — but reckoned without the partisan scrutiny caused by his BBC appearance.
Rows over BBC audiences periodically blow up online, as commentators profess outrage that the people most likely to give up their evening to watch a live political discussion programme are the politically engaged. A BBC editor pointed out that others on the programme were Conservative members.
A Leigh Day spokesperson said: “We can confirm that Aman Thakar is currently a solicitor at Leigh Day in our employment department. We have been made aware of a tweet which we are taking very seriously. Mr Thakar has been suspended with immediate effect from the firm whilst we carry out an internal investigation into these matters.”
Solicitors from Gowling WLG, Pinsent Masons and DWF tell us what their jobs are really like
At ‘Secrets to Success Birmingham’ last week three lawyers from Gowling WLG, Pinsent Masons and DWF took questions from over 50 students in a discussion chaired by Legal Cheek journalist Adam Mawardi and hosted at The University of Law.
Each of the trio worked in different practice areas — with Gowling WLG partner Jasvir Jootla specialising in corporate law, restructuring and insolvency; Pinsent Masons’ Ian Morgan practising in his firm’s property dispute resolution team; and DWF’s Narrinder Taggar focusing on civil litigation relating to personal injury and insurance.
Here are the highlights of what they shared about the reality of life as a lawyer at a large corporate law firm.
“There is no such thing as a typical day — which is one of the things I love about being a litigator,” said Ian Morgan, an associate in the property dispute resolution team at Pinsent Masons. “You never know in the morning what is going to have happened by the evening. For example, a client may call saying ‘I need an injunction!’ and on those days your to-do list that you began the morning with may well end up left undone.”
DWF’s Narrinder Taggar, a senior associate specialising in civil litigation, agreed, noting that lawyers need to be able to reconcile the conflicting demands of “constant emails that need responding to” with the urgent twists and turns of a case that can require them to “drop everything”.
Gowling WLG corporate partner Jasvir Jootla, whose focus is on transactional rather than contentious work, provided a different perspective. Her day often starts with “a telecon with clients or a videocon with the team in London”. As a partner there are then face-to-face meetings on topics like “planning the pipeline of future work” and marketing and business development. Then there is the business of Jootla handling her own restructuring and insolvency practice. How does she manage all the work? “You learn to prioritise and distinguish between what is actually urgent and what is presented as urgent but can wait.”
‘Secrets to Success’ in Birmingham
All three of the lawyers work hard, but in different ways. Jootla finds that she often needs time and space away from the 9-5 hustle to think complex things through. “Some matters are complicated and I just need to lock myself away in a room for an hour to get to the bottom of them. I tend to do that after 6pm when the office is quieter,” she said.
Taggar became a solicitor via the Chartered Institute of Legal Executives (CILEx) after a series of jobs including egg packer and customer services manager. She spoke about the drive and passion that is required to enter law as a career changer. She has carried those qualities with her to a practice that sees her time split between DWF’s Birmingham office and its London office in the Walkie-Talkie building.
Morgan, meanwhile, told the audience how under Pinsent Masons’ flexible working programme he has chosen to work four days a week. “Fortunately the discourse around mental health and wellbeing is changing and now it is possible to take more control of your work/life balance if you have a supportive firm,” he said.
Another feature of the lawyers’ working lives is building up commercial awareness around the particular industries they serve. Whether it is commercial property clients, insurers or financial institutions, being among these institutions gives the lawyers an understanding of the bigger picture around how business and law interacts. “It’s about really understanding the challenges faced by clients,” commented Morgan, while Jootla said that having a strong feel for “the drivers” behind a particular industry is key. But at the same time, she added, lawyers’ value stems in a large part from their “critical thinking and analysis skills.”
Since Morgan, Taggar and Jootla started their careers they have noticed an increase in their firms’ engagement with new technology — most recently artificial intelligence (AI), which Gowling WLG, Pinsent Masons and DWF are all among the leading firms on. This is making their lives easier, with Taggar sharing details of her firm testing increasingly sophisticated software to reduce the time spent reviewing medical records. “This used to take a long time but is now in a large part done for you,” she said.
At Pinsent Masons there are nearly 40 full-time legal technologists working around the clock to make the firm more innovative and efficient, including in Morgan’s practice area of commercial property where there is a specific trainee seat in property law innovation.
Meanwhile Jootla has been observing how banks and other financial institution clients are experimenting with AI and “wanting their law firms to partner with them on tech and go on the same learning journey”. In the future, she suggested that “perhaps a different type of lawyer may be needed”.
The discussion closed with each lawyer asked to give a piece of advice to their law student self?
“If at first you don’t succeed, try and try again,” urged Morgan.
“Your network is your net worth,” said Taggar.
“Just relax,” smiled Jootla. “Law is a long journey and a very worthwhile one.”
A trainee solicitor has called on the government to make employers legally obliged to give staff time off work so they can make life-saving donations of bone marrow and stem cells.
Paul Fletcher-Herd, a trainee solicitor at Scottish outfit Aberdein Considine, has launched a petition that, if successful, could impose a legal duty on employers to give staff time off if they’re found to be a match for a person who requires an urgent transplant.
Fletcher-Herd’s petition, which has so far attracted over 750 signatures, is in memory of his friend Cammy Smith, who lost his battle with Leukaemia in 2014.
Having seen first-hand how stem cell transplants helped extended Smith’s life, the solicitor-to-be registered as a donor and, six years later, was called into action after being flagged as a potential match. Fortunately, his firm was more than happy to give him the time off work — but others, according to Fletcher-Herd, aren’t so lucky.
“Every single person who joins the Anthony Nolan and NHS Stem Cell Registry has the potential to give someone a second chance of life,” Fletcher-Herd writes on his petition. “An employer should not prevent that from happening — it could mean the difference between life and death.”
The Aberdonian, who had to attend a special clinic in London to donate, continues: “During my experience donating stem cells it became apparent that many people are keen to sign up to the register but they are discouraged by the fear that their employer will either not allow them the time off or will discriminate against them for taking the time off.”
At 10,000 signatures, the government will respond to his petition, while 100,000 signatures will see it considered for debate in parliament. You can sign the petition here.
International outfit RPC has posted a 2019 autumn retention score of 42%, citing a number of trainees vying to qualify in “significantly oversubscribed” practice areas as the reason for the low result.
Of the 12 rookies who qualified this year, ten applied for permanent positions at its London HQ but only five were kept on as newly qualified (NQ) solicitors. Today’s 42% result is a combined percentage based on RPC’s spring and autumn qualifiers.
Simon Hart, partner and training principal at RPC, said:
“Firstly, we’d like to congratulate those who will qualify with us as NQs in the autumn. It was an extremely competitive process, with some high quality applicants. However, we are disappointed that our retention rate this year is lower than we typically see at RPC, largely due to applications into certain practice areas being significantly oversubscribed and us being unable to accommodate everybody with the number of roles available.”
He added: “We are committed to our application process and are confident that we will see our retention rates return to previous form in 2020.”
RPC has posted solid trainee retention results over recent years. In the previous two autumn rounds, the City firm — which is best known for its high-end insurance work — scored 82%, keeping 14 out of 17 qualifying trainees on both occasions.
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Letter to Justice Committee aims to skewer super-exam
The chair of the Junior Lawyers Division (JLD) has written to the Justice Committee seeking an inquiry into the Legal Services Board’s (LSB) decision to approve the new solicitor super-exam.
In an open letter addressed to Bob Neill MP, chair of the House of Commons Justice Committee, Amy Clowrey, expresses concern that the Solicitors Qualifying Examination (SQE) — which will replace both the Legal Practice Course (LPC) and Graduate Diploma in Law (GDL) when it comes into force in September 2021 — will “be contrary to the public interest”, “not be in the interest of consumers” and “result in lower professional standards”.
The Solicitors Regulation Authority’s (SRA) plans to replace traditional routes to qualification were approved by the LSB — an independent body responsible for overseeing the regulation of lawyers across England and Wales — in March 2018. This came despite former criminal barrister Neill urging the legal watchdog to defer its decision for six months, “to enable the SRA’s application to be given more careful scrutiny”.
The JLD of The Law Society, which represents approximately 70,000 LPC students, trainees and solicitors with up to five years’ post qualification experience (PQE) is supportive of a centralised assessment and been involved in the consultation process but has put forward a number of outstanding concerns, namely “the removal of the requirement to study academic law substantively, assessment by method of multiple-choice question (MCQ) examination, training requiring only ‘the opportunity’ to develop the necessary competencies and sign-off being possible by a newly qualified solicitor who may not ever have met the trainee”.
There is a prima facie risk, Clowrey continues, that “these changes will lead to a decrease in the standard of assessment and experience necessary to qualify as a solicitor and ultimately a decline in the service provided to consumers (with a consequent deterioration in the reputation of the profession domestically and internationally)”.
Speaking to Legal Cheek, Law Society council member and JLD rep, Laura Uberoi, said: “The JLD remains concerned about the lack of detail around, and scrutiny being applied to, the SQE that is due to be implemented in 2021. We are proud that solicitors are currently held to a high standard and that we are becoming a more diverse profession — it is imperative we maintain these qualities with the implementation of the SQE.”
The LSB will have to approve a further application from the SRA before the SQE can be implemented. The JLD requests the Justice Committee holds either “an evidence session” or “a short inquiry” to review the LSB’s approval of the SQE to date before the next stage of the SQE application process.
The SQE will be split into two parts: SQE1 focusing on black letter law and taking the form of a computer-based, multiple-choice assessment, while SQE2 will test prospective solicitors’ practical legal skills such as advocacy and interviewing.
International player Hogan Lovells has upped the pay packets of its newly qualified (NQ) solicitors by a whopping £12,000.
Until recently, those qualifying into the firm’s swish City of London headquarters enjoyed a not too shabby salary of £78,000. Now, the corporate outfit has bumped this figure by 15% and will be paying its newbie associates £90,000 a year, Legal Cheek can reveal. Hogan Lovells confirmed its junior lot will also be eligible for a discretionary bonus of up to 30% on top of the new and improved salary, giving a potential total pay package of up to £117,000. With UK inflation currently at 2%, the rise — which is effective from 1 May 2019 — is more than seven times the rate of inflation.
News of today’s MoneyLaw move means Hogan Lovells has leapfrogged a host of City players — including two out of five of the magic circle — in the NQ pay league. As things stand, NQs at Herbert Smith Freehills earn £85,000, while their counterparts at elite duo Allen & Overy and Linklaters receive base rates of £83,000 respectively.
Confirmation of the pay uplift follows similar moves made by the magic circle in the last month which has been sparked by soaring US law firm London office NQ salaries. In May Freshfields raised the game when it announced it was increasing its NQ salary to £100,000. Clifford Chance and Slaughter and May followed Freshies’ lead in June and matched the six-figure sum. It’s worth noting that both CC’s and Slaughters’ NQ pay figure is a combination of basic salary and bonus. While it is unclear exactly how much CC pays out bonus aside, Slaughters has confirmed a baseline salary of £92,000. You can check out what all the top firms pay on Legal Cheek’s Firms Most List.
Hogan Lovells confirmed trainee pay has also increased by £1,000. The firm’s London trainees will earn £46,000 in their first year, rising to £51,000 in their second year — representing a rise of 2% across the board. The firm offers around 50 training contracts each year.
Aside from the very enviable salaries, what’s it like working at the transatlantic giant? Hogan Lovells scored A*s for training, peer support and those all-important perks, and received commendations in all three categories at the Legal Cheek Awards earlier this year.
Travers Smith has confirmed 17 of its 21 trainees due to qualify in September have accepted permanent newly qualified (NQ) positions at its City of London base. This hands the firm, which offers 25 training contracts each year, a solid 2019 autumn retention rate of 81%.
Four soon-to-be associates will join the two-office-outfit’s dispute resolution team, while three are private equity bound. The firm’s commercial, IP & technology and corporate finance departments will receive two rookies apiece. Competition, finance, financial services & markets, investment funds, pensions and tax will each gain one NQ lawyer. Two rookies didn’t receive offers, while the other two opted to leave for other outfits.
Travers’ fresh-faced recruits will start on a salary of £78,500 which places them just above their opposite numbers at a host of City players including Mayer Brown (£78,000), Baker McKenzie (£77,000) and Norton Rose Fulbright (£77,000). Trainees at Travers currently earn £45,000 in year one, rising to £50,500 in year two.
Today’s performance represents a slight dip on Travers’ autumn 2018 score. On that occasion, the firm — which is perhaps best known for its private equity practice — posted a perfect 100% rate, keeping all of its 21 qualifiers. Travers unveiled a 90% rate (18 out of 20) in 2017 and 94% (17 out of 18) in 2016.
In this year’s Trainee and Junior Lawyer Survey, Travers scored A*s in four categories including training and quality of work, and received commendations in five categories including Firm of the Year, at the Legal Cheek Awards earlier this year.
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Newbie associates at A&O’s One Bishops Square base will start lawyer life on a “minimum total cash” of £100,000, comprised of salary and a “sign-on bonus”. Like with CC and Slaughters, A&O’s headline NQ pay figure is a combination of basic salary and bonus. Freshies’ lot, however, out-earn their magic circle counterparts with discretionary bonuses on top of their staggering six-figure salaries.
A first-year A&O trainee earns £45,000, rising to £50,000 in their second year. Today’s money move means juniors will be pulling in almost double their salaries straight out of their training contracts. The firm’s previous NQ salary was £83,000.
The pay rise comes amid speculation of a transatlantic tie-up between A&O and US firm O’Melveny & Myers to create one of the world’s largest law firms with combined revenues totalling £2 billion ($2.8 billion).
It remains to be seen whether the final firm of the elite fivesome plans to follow suit. Linklaters has not yet upped NQ remuneration in 2019 which currently stands at £83,000.
Four lawyers cut through the hype at our latest student event in Reading
When Matt Walker, a partner in Shoosmiths’ real estate team, first started in law, there wasn’t internet access in his office and email did not yet exist. Lawyers didn’t type (or touch-type for that matter); they would dictate to a secretary who would type for them. For Jeff Chang, a partner in Osborne Clarke’s corporate group, amending contracts by hand and perusing swathes of lever arch files to analyse due diligence risks contained within clients’ contracts was the norm.
Two decades later and both lawyers, who were two of four panellists at this month’s ‘Innovation and the law’ event held at The University of Law (ULaw) in Reading, noted the marked shift in the way in which they work largely in part due to the ‘digital revolution’.
“The pace of change has been quick,” said Walker. “Real estate lawyers were notorious for having paperwork lying around. I now work entirely paperless: all deeds are now stored in our online system. I can work from anywhere: I don’t need a desk or a work phone; my work is entirely driven through my laptop and that has been an enormous change over the span of my career,” he added. Now that contracts can be drafted and uploaded electronically, and intelligent contract review platforms can analyse thousands of documents in a matter of minutes, the cost of carrying out a typical due diligence exercise for Chang’s clients has reduced significantly.
So what are some of the innovations that have brought about this change?
Shoosmiths’ Spotlight is one such innovation. The smart due diligence tool has changed the game when it comes to reviewing and negotiating commercial contracts — a menial task which would have previously kept the firm’s trainees and paralegals toiling away for hours on end, explained Walker. Matters+ is another tool developed by the firm. The cloud-based app is targeted at in-house legal teams to track, analyse and manage their workloads.
Spearheading the digital revolution at Osborne Clarke is partner and innovation specialist Dan Wright, Chang explained. Wright leads the firm’s service innovation programme, ‘Osborne Clarke Solutions’: a twelve-member (and growing) team that helps clients explore how they would like legal services to be delivered to maximise value to their businesses. “It’s one way we keep our clients sticky,” noted Chang, who advises high growth tech businesses.
Appearing alongside Walker and Chang was Christopher Cameron, a newly qualified corporate and commercial solicitor at Blandy & Blandy. He told the audience of over 30 students that the Thames Valley outfit has recently revamped its website to include an intelligent chatbot feature which directs potential clients to a relevant lawyer within the firm. A new online portal is also in the pipeline which will serve as a tool for fee-earners to interact swiftly with and update clients on a transaction.
The panel at this month’s ‘Innovation in the law’ event in Reading; from left to right: Jeff Chang, Matt Walker, Christopher Cameron and Sarah Pooley
Of course, tech is not without its limits. That natural thought process, the ability to innovate or look your client in the eye and bestow confidence in them simply cannot be replicated by robots. “Tech helps drive efficiencies to get to an end point but the lawyer-client relationship will always be paramount,” said Chang.
As law firms embrace innovation through technology to keep up with the pace of change, it’s imperative that law schools, who prepare lawyers of the future for the world of work, do the same. Sarah Pooley, dean of ULaw’s Reading and Guildford campuses, who was also on the panel, explained that ensuring students are informed about the developments taking place in law firms are central to the curriculum offering. Last December the leading education provider announced plans to launch in Nottingham. This, alongside its city centre campuses of Leeds and London Moorgate, have been termed ‘legal tech hubs’ where a new MSc in Legal Technology covering everything from artificial intelligence (AI) to cyber law, is available to students with an appetite for tech. ULaw also has a new undergraduate LLB in Law with Legal Innovation and Technology which will be delivered at its London Bloomsbury site in addition to the Nottingham, Leeds and Moorgate campuses.
The present wave of innovation has facilitated the agile working movement. The panel were in agreement that lawyers truly can work remotely from anywhere, even if, as Chang put it, that is “in the car connected to any one of our offices from your phone” or “at a client’s office.”
This is in part reflective of an increasingly more diverse workforce and culture within law firms. At Osborne Clarke, for example, lawyers have embraced connected working, which means they work more flexibly, collaboratively and responsively with one another and clients.
There has, however, been a slight “pushback” to the movement, noted Shoosmiths’ Walker. “Most law firms are as agile as they can be: people are increasingly all over the place in terms of where and how they work. We’ve got to a point where we’re not seeing enough of everyone. The majority of the time only half my team is in the office. There’s a balance to be struck and we’re considering how best to make it work. We think everyone should be in the office at least one day a week as a touchpoint,” he said.
What then does this mean for trainee and junior lawyers, who require an element of supervision in their early years? The panel agreed it’s important they are in and around the office developing networks and at the forefront of seniors’ minds when it comes to getting on the meaty deals and transactions. “Sure, you can ping over an email or pick up the phone but it’s just so much easier when someone is sat there right next to you,” said Cameron. Chang agreed: “You hear and pick up a lot from colleagues talking around the office. I wouldn’t want a trainee to spend two hours tackling a problem a partner could help them with in two minutes.”
It’s fair to say technology is changing the game within law firms. But don’t let an over-reliance on tech cast aside your knowledge of the law. Chang closed out with some words of warning:
“There may come a time when you do not have access to the internet or one of your precedent documents and will have to draft a contract freehand. It is very important — and I cannot stress this enough — to know your black letter law. Being a slave to tech won’t make you a very good lawyer.”
In-house option sees associates spend 12 months working with global outfit’s top advocates
Junior lawyers at Herbert Smith Freehills (HSF) will now have an opportunity to hone their advocacy skills thanks to a new in-house secondment.
Legal Cheek can reveal the global outfit has launched a secondment programme, which will see two junior associates each year join the firm’s in-house Advocacy Group. Launched in 2004, the unit is made up of around 160 lawyers across the globe, including a number of top QCs, and forms an integral part of its litigation and arbitration practice.
HSF confirmed it’s starting to take applications from existing associates who have at least two years’ post-qualification experience (PQE), with the first secondee due to take up their spot within the team this September. Secondees will spend one year with the unit before returning to their original team.
“I am proud of what we have achieved with our Global Advocacy Initiative and am excited about the further plans we have for the offering,” Damien Byrne Hill, head of disputes in HSF’s London office, said. “We believe that advocacy is a skill which lies at the heart of everything we do as disputes lawyers. Our ambition is to develop advocacy skills and court craft throughout our disputes division and the underlying raison d’être our Advocacy Group is to help us achieve that.”
Meanwhile, HSF confirmed commercial disputes partner Gary Milner-Moore has moved across to the Advocacy Group. The solicitor advocate qualified at HSF in 1997 and has been a partner since 2004. Milner-Moore will join existing partners Adam Johnson QC, who was appointed as a deputy High Court judge last year, and Tom Leech QC, to lead the firm’s Global Advocacy Group.
International outfit also reportedly looking to move to smaller — but swankier — City office space
Baker McKenzie has cut 46 support roles within its City HQ as part of an ongoing shake-up across its professional and business services functions.
The international outfit, which placed 97 London-based roles under review last year, confirmed 18 members of staff had resigned, 15 had accepted an enhanced redundancy package and 31 had their roles cut but were found alternative positions at the firm.
The remaining 33 roles, spread across Bakers’ human resources, finance, business development, marketing and communications, and knowledge management teams, are understood to be still at risk.
The cuts come after the firm announced in October last year it was launching a three-year review of its global support capabilities.
A spokesperson for Bakers said: “The ongoing review in London is part of the firm’s three-year global reorganization of our professional business services functions, which includes the creation of new roles, growth in our service centres and investments in new technologies and new services.”
They continued: “We are grateful to our people in London and globally for their engagement, professionalism and patience throughout this process to date. We continue to work with those still in roles at risk and in cases where suitable alternative roles are unavailable will offer an enhanced redundancy package.”
It has also been reported that the firm is on the hunt for a new home in London. According to Legal Week (£), Bakers has called upon the services of estate agent Savills as it looks to downsize its London office space by up to 10,000 sq ft.
An unnamed partner at the firm told the website: “Like every law firm, we’ve concluded we can probably do with less space. One option is to refurbish the current building and add another floor on top, but everyone would like to move to a nice shiny office. We’re in a good location but the space is tired, and clients want the wow factor.”
#TakeYourMPToWork campaign aims to highlight pressing need for properly funded justice system
A group of MPs will shadow legal aid lawyers as part of a new campaign aimed at demonstrating first-hand why comprehensive, early legal advice is so vital.
Over 35 MPs from across the country have signed up to take part in the cross-party initiative, spearheaded by the All-Party Parliamentary Group on Legal Aid and Young Legal Aid Lawyers, which launches next month.
The #TakeYourMPToWork campaign follows the government’s recent commitment to piloting early legal advice in housing law, which was severely cut following the introduction of the 2012 Legal Aid, Sentencing and Punishment of Offenders Act (LAPSO). Since the cuts, ‘legal aid deserts’ have reportedly emerged across the country where members of the public that can’t afford access to legal advice must represent themselves.
Criticising the government’s legal aid pilot for its narrow scope, the campaign argues that legal matters are complex, multi-faceted problems not limited to one area of law (for example, housing problems often stem from debt or issues with welfare) which if prevented from escalating through early legal advice could “save money and save stress”. By inviting MPs to shadow legal aid lawyers, the campaign hopes to build parliamentary support for legal aid in all areas of social welfare law to be restored.
The MPs taking part include legal aid minister, Paul Maynard, former barrister and current minister of justice, Robert Buckland, shadow justice secretary, Richard Burgon, as well as former barrister and current Conservative MP, Alex Chalk, former Conservative and leader of Change UK, Anna Soubry, and Green Party MP Caroline Lucas.
However, those seeking legal advice are not the only ones affected. Yesterday a legal aid solicitor took to Twitter to reveal that she had been made redundant as a result of the government’s cuts.
I am in my 20s. I am a criminal duty solicitor and supervisor already. I have worked exclusively and passionately in legal aid (including mental health and prison law) since university for over 7 years… and now I am redundant. #TheLawIsBroken#legalaid
In a further tweet, the lawyer, who goes by the name @LegalAidLass on Twitter, reveals she graduated with a 2:1 from a red brick university and achieved a distinction in the LPC. Now, despite having worked “tirelessly in legal aid”, she needs to find a job before “the next CRM12 deadline in less than three weeks”.
I graduated from a red brick uni with a 2.1. Got a distinction in the LPC. Worked tirelessly in legal aid. Became a mental health tribunal member, duty solicitor + supervisor. Now redundant in my 20s + need a job by the next CRM12 deadline in less than 3 weeks… #TheLawIsBroken
Data has the potential to revolutionise the way clients and lawyers work. Clients are already looking for tech solutions in relation to legal service delivery to maximise efficiency and hit deadlines. It is a question that often arises at client pitches.
Equally, just as Netflix and Amazon utilise user data to offer customers a personalised streaming or shopping experience, law firms, too, could in theory use data to identify and cater to some of their clients’ needs. Yet, according to Rif Kapadi, a senior associate in Pinsent Masons’ privacy, technology and commercial team, it may be a while before the legal profession, known and trusted for being typically risk averse, gets fully on board with this type of retail approach to servicing clients. He tells us:
“It’s just about getting that balance between what’s technologically and legally possible and then what clients are ready for — and I’m not sure if they’re ready for that just yet.”
Although tech is here to stay for law firms and their clients, caution around privacy is proving to be constant for the tech revolution. Not only do clients seek legal advice on privacy and tech issues, but they are also increasingly seeking assurances that their own data and information is robustly protected, says the University of Leicester law grad.
As law firms increasingly shift away from paper-based filing systems, they become a wealth of electronically-stored, sensitive information. As a result, firms, like any other business have to become more diligent in protecting themselves against cyber-incidents to ensure data doesn’t fall into the wrong hands. “It’s fair to say, data is a top five concern for nearly every boardroom,” Kapadi explains.
Kapadi reflects on the Cambridge Analytica scandal which used the Facebook data of tens of millions of people for political advertising purposes. Following reports of its illicit data-sharing tactics last year, the British political consultancy firm filed for insolvency. For Kapadi, the privacy scandal demonstrates that “a client can get into trouble, destroy a hard-earned reputation and even go bust very quickly” if they misuse data.
Legal measures have been invoked to bring personal data laws into the twenty first century. Standing out is the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), said to be the largest shake-up to data privacy in two decades. A framework designed for the modern digital age, the European privacy law established clear guidelines aiming to harmonise on how data is collected, stored and ultimately regulated.
Although, following its implementation last year, the GDPR has put businesses on edge (especially in light of the hefty fines and stop order which can be imposed if breaches occur), Kapadi believes its arrival has changed the market place for the better. Requiring greater transparency in how data is processed assists to curtail the chances of privacy-invasive tactics being employed — and the new individual rights empower consumers in the process. So, when Kapadi, who practises in Pinsent Masons’ Manchester office, is advising retailers on whether data sourced from in-store tracking is collected fairly; or negotiating with financial services providers on the storage of customer data in a cloud environment; or even acting on disputes that ensue from misusing or losing data, it’s GDPR and reputational impact that clients are very concerned about.
The life of a privacy and commercial lawyer is not without its pressures. According to Article 33 of the GDPR, data security breaches must be reported within a tight time frame of 72 hours after first being discovered — at which point, Kapadi says, “it’s all hands-on deck” to investigate the extent of any damage and put in place mitigation steps.
That said, West-Yorkshire born Kapadi admits to enjoying the challenge: “One of the reasons I love being a privacy lawyer is the problem solving aspect of the job.” It was critical thinking, detailed analysis and persuasive reasoning that first attracted Kapadi to legal practice away from some more commonly tread family paths, such as medicine and independent business. Just as important as problem solving, however, is empathy. Kapadi explains:
“One question I often find myself asking is: ‘How I would react if this was my own right to privacy, my data, or the data of my son or daughter?’ So, on the one hand, I’m considering legal problems — drafting contracts, interpreting legislation and, on the other, raising ethical questions and considering a project from a human rights impact and consumer perspective.”
So, what does this mean for lawyers of the future? Being tech-savvy and fluent in code is great and can be a great “in” or “sell” that will impress recruiters and clients alike (as is any other wider area of non-law expertise), but successful candidates will need also to be conscious of the risks and opportunities that riding the tech wave brings.
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(@Aman_Sez) 
