Champions Of The World

Move over Greenpeace.

Caroline Spelman, take a look at how it’s done.

Even Al Gore and the whole Live Earth campaign can’t compete with us.

That’s it. Legal recruitment – saving the environment and reversing global warming one lawyer at a time.

So where’s the evidence of this? Well, it’s very simple. We bring lawyers back closer to home. Recently we have been responsible for chopping the commute of one partner from a three hour daily round trip by car (on a good day!) to one of six minutes each way by bike. Over the course of a year that works out at 669 hours being reduced to less than 50. Or put another way, 25 days 21 hours extra at home every year.

Congratulations; you change your job, we give you almost a month of your life back per year.

So without even going into carbon footprints, stress associated with increased travel and such like, the benefits of looking closer to home can be immense.

Of course we can’t always guarantee an outcome as good as this example, but at the same time this is not a unique case. In the six months before we also facilitated a similar move for another partner in the same discipline, with the commute cut from 1hr each way to less than eight minutes, along with a 20% pay increase.

So why do we still jump in our cars or on trains and commute for the equivalent of a month or more out of the 12 we get per year? Well, for some it is simple logistics; if you live remotely then it can often require a commute to get anywhere. For others it may be the quality of work; partners at Magic Circle firms may find they struggle to get work of a similar calibre in the middle of Snowdonia.

However often it can be a simple lack of local knowledge; the nearby market may have grown significantly, but because you have spent the last twenty years working in the City then you have never even realised that this is the case. For example, are you aware that:-

• more than half of the Top 25 UK firms have a presence in other major UK cities apart from London?

• there is at least one firm where, by 2014, the top EPs can draw up to £1.5m in the regions?

So you get to spend more time at home with the family, or out on the golf course (although for many lawyers that may be difficult to achieve – some spend more time out there than Nick Faldo) or any other hobbies which have suffered as work has taken over.

You lose the stress of the commute, as well as the cost in a world of spiralling fuel prices.

You get to handle top quality work without needing to sell your soul to the City.

And you reduce your carbon footprint to the size of a gnat.

Legal recruiters? Pah, call us marriage-saving time-enhancing career-improving pay-rising global warming-curing eco-warriors! Might struggle to fit it on the business card, mind.

Sorry Swampy but your time has passed; there’s a new breed of tree hugger in town.

Are you interested in getting your life-back, redressing that work-life balance that seems to allude you at every turn? Talk to one of our specialist professionals as VG Charles & Co on 0121 233 5000 / 020 7649 9094 or visit our website www.vgcharles.com

What NQs Did Next

For an experienced lawyer or HR professional it’s a bit like seeing your kids growing up and leaving the nest. You’ve nurtured them, you’ve developed their skills and now the time has come to let them stand on their own two feet. You can’t be there to take them by the hand the whole way through life; they now have to plough their own furrow, armed with the knowledge and expertise that you have imparted to them.

That’s right, 3 or 4 more weeks and you’ll have to wave goodbye to that trainee of yours. Chin up, son. No tears, there’s a good lad.



Of course if you are a prospective NQ then you may well be experiencing what Sir Alex Ferguson famously referred to as ‘squeaky bum time’. Your firm has 10 trainees but only 6 spaces which means there is a 40% chance that you will be looking for alternative employment. The good news is that the market is nowhere near as bad as it was this time last year, and is massively better than where we were at in 2009, but unfortunately we’re still not in a position where many firms’ requirements will stretch beyond their own trainees.

Frankly Dad, we’d rather not fly the nest right now if it’s all the same to you? I’m still not sure that I got the hang of those commercial contracts during my first seat; any chance I could do it again?


So the market isn’t bleak, but it’s not great either; what are you going to do?

Stage One: get a bloody good CV together. You are now at the point which will make or break your entire career. Get yourself a great NQ job and you’re well on the way to building up that vital PQE which will be your badge for the entirety of your professional life.

Stage Two: get another bloody good CV together. As mentioned in our last blog (http://vgcharles.blogspot.com/2011/07/selling-out.html) it’s important that your CV does the best possible job of ‘selling you’ as it can. If you would consider a post-qualification role in either employment or litigation don’t rely on one CV doing the job for you; have one for each and make sure that the right CV goes to the right vacancy.

Stage Three: get yourself a good legal recruitment consultant. Unless you’re thinking of plastering the market yourself in the hope that something sticks (not recommended) then you need to be talking to someone who knows the market in-depth. Once done you can be confident that as soon as something becomes available that you are getting a call about it; a good recruiter will also be willing to work proactively on your behalf and will have the contacts to make sure they are talking to decision makers, not that your CV will land on a pile with a hundred others. Speak to other people about the recruiters they used; if they can testify recruiter x went out into the market proactively and effectively then this is a good sign, even if that recruiter didn’t ultimately get them the job. If however recruiter y seemed to sit on their hands and wait for a job to land on their desk then it may be worth avoiding them.

Stage Four: identify what makes you good and tell the world. We wade through numerous NQ CVs which state about how well a candidate performed in a university mooting competition, or how close they came to a 2:1, or the fact that they ran a 5k race for charity. Frankly, all of that’s piddle.

What you need to be saying is what makes you different to every other NQ out there. A couple of NQs that we have worked with recently have, for example, trained with niche practices where they have actually gained a level of experience beyond that which you would expect from an NQ. Instead of doing 4 six-month seats these candidates have done a mixture of contentious and non-contentious work in a specific area such as employment or IP and have ran their own files, meaning that they actually have the experience and acumen of someone of circa 1yr PQE. If this applies to you, make sure you tell someone!

Stage Five: don’t limit yourself if you can avoid it. Of course if you are married or cohabiting then you may find that relocation is a definite ‘no’ but if for example you have trained with a Magic Circle firm you may find that, whilst opportunities within the Square Mile are limited, there is actually quite a few openings in other cities like Birmingham or Manchester which can offer work of a comparable quality and which are always keen on candidates who have had the kind of training that you have had. If you can relocate then don’t limit yourself too much; you can always return ‘home’ at some point in the future.

Stage Six: don’t give up. Many firms will appear to have closed their doors to NQ recruitment, although in some cases it may be they don’t feel their own trainees are strong enough. You may find that once their trainees have left the practice the opportunities for NQs suddenly come back onto the market. Also, in the wake of the recession firms are likely to under-recruit rather than overstaff, although after a couple of months those same practices realise that they could do with another NQ after all – so keep looking!


The signs of an improving NQ market are there for all to see, with some firms retention in the 90+% range (http://www.rollonfriday.com/TheNews/EuropeNews/tabid/58/Id/1453/fromTab/58/Default.aspx) although admittedly a few are still some way off this. You can take solace from the fact that this year is likely to be one of the best years for qualification out of the last three or four, so take on board some of the above and hopefully that ‘leaving the nest’ feeling will turn out to be a blessing in disguise.

Are you a newly-qualified or soon-to-qualify solicitor still seeking that new role. Or is your firm in the market for a high quality NQ but finding that you are struggling to attract candidates of the calibre you require? To discuss NQ recruitment from either side call one of our specialist consultants at VG Charles & Co on 0121 233 5000 / 020 7649 9094 or visit our website www.vgcharles.com

Selling Out

And so there it is. News of the World, rest in peace. 1843-2011. Not a bad innings, but that’s it. All over. Rain stops play.

That is, if by ‘rain’ you mean an absolute torrent of public outrage being aimed in your general direction and which, having caused the termination of the NOTW now also threatens to derail Rupert Murdoch’s plans to take over BSkyB. So, pretty heavy rain then.

And what was it that brought the self-proclaimed ‘Britain’s biggest selling paper’ to its knees?

Well, it was just that. Sales. That desire to sell more than your rivals, at almost any costs, which caused the ethics to be lost somewhere along the way.

One thing that you can’t fault them on however is that ability to sell themselves. Everyone reading this blog will have a different opinion on the quality of the journalism and how relevant the stories are to their own lives and agendas, but when it comes to the ability to self-promote the NOTW and other News International publications have proven to have few who can (or could) touch them.

Many of you will regularly meet clients and hand over sleek, professionally put together promotional material which will testify to why you are the best firm to instruct. Working together with your marketing team you have produced an enviable document/presentation which intimates that you are the people to do the work, and that the client might as well cancel meeting all of the other lawyers who are potentially in line. You are that good. Oh yes.

Yet startlingly enough when it comes to putting together a CV that ability to self-promote somehow seems to go completely out of the window. We are regularly in conversation with senior level lawyers and partners who produce a résumé for us which tells us absolutely nothing about them, their work, their expertise nor how they could add value to a potential new employer.

And let me tell you; a legal recruiter’s time is extremely valuable. Unless it is a retained search then essentially a legal recruitment consultant is working on a no-win no-fee basis, and hence has to prioritise exactly who they should work on behalf of and to what extent. We have always prided ourselves as being a legal recruitment consultancy which goes the extra mile, which means that we don’t just sit here and wait for roles to land on our desk. We go out there into the market proactively and confidentially to source opportunities for strong candidates that we may be working with, usually at the expense of others who we have to judge may not have as much to offer.

The curriculum vitae that you produce is probably the most valuable tool that you have in terms of finding that next role. Therefore you owe it to yourself that your CV does as good a job to sell you as possible. Here’s how.



1) Make it clear. Who you are. Where you work. Where you previously worked. What type of work do you do. What type of clients do you act for. Where you went to university.

2) Be explicit. Not in a Christian Bale on the set of ‘Terminator’ kind of way, but focus on the type of work that you do and elaborate on this. If your description of your most recent relevant role doesn’t take up half-to-three-quarters of a side of A4 minimum then there’s not enough in there.

3) Don’t be explicit. Think about what’s really relevant. If you are a newly-qualified lawyer then the fact that you spent three months on a placement at Clifford Chance during your summer break before the LPC is useful to know. If you have around 30 years PQE working with leading national firms and billing £600k per annum for blue-chip clients then it’s not quite so important.

4) Name drop. But don’t name drop. Don’t be afraid to talk about notable matters that you’ve dealt with, particularly if they are reported cases. Perhaps include a couple of lines about how each progressed and what the result was. But be confidential; your client may not wish to be named and have it banded around the market how you reached a particular resolution or what they were accused of. Also bear in mind that your future employer may not want to hire someone who will disclose the entire client base at the drop of a hat.

5) Don’t keep it to two sides. For crying out loud, don’t keep it to two sides. In the words of Baz Luhrmann ‘If I could offer you only one tip for the future...’...... he then went on to rattle off some twaddle about wearing sunscreen, which is decent advice admittedly, but when it comes to getting a job it’s not as important as making sure your CV says as much about you as it needs to. If you’ve handled a range of corporate matters including five mergers worth £3bn, nine acquisitions of £12bn+, assisted with the MBOs of eleven FTSE 100 PLCs and also assisted one client who successfully purchased the moon then are you really going to sit there and work out which ones are least important just to save on one extra side of A4?

6) Don’t keep it two sides. There you are, you’ve been told twice now.

7) Understand what your CV is. It’s not a bit of paper with your name written on it and a basic career history:- we could get that from LinkedIn. Your CV is a tool to get you to interview. If you are going for a role doing commercial IT which requires outsourcing then you need to need to make sure that your CV says that you have done outsourcing. It may not be a partner who is shortlisting, so whoever is measuring your CV against the job spec needs to be able to tick each part of the criteria against your CV.

8) It won’t ‘do’. Your CV, if starting from scratch, should take you upwards of an hour to get right, and to get all of the relevant information on there. If it’s taken you 15 minutes then throw it away because it’s rubbish.

9) Be proud. Talk about your achievements. Don’t feel bad about being accused of ‘blowing your own trumpet’. In fact forget the trumpet - get a whole brass band in if you’re that good.

10) Make more than one CV. Only if its relevant to do so, but if you are a commercial litigator who also does property litigation and would look at opportunities in both then have a CV for each; one which lists your prop lit first and at some length, and the other which covers the basics of your comm lit practice but makes it clear that property if your no. 1. Then produce another which flips this around and incorporates your prop lit into you general experience, and ensure that the appropriate CV goes to the right vacancy.


So that’s it. Your CV may not be the News of the World (although hopefully more truthful than some of the stuff they reported over the years) but invest the time and effort in getting a document which ‘sells’ you and your experience and your chances of securing that interview will increase enormously. If you are unsure then speak with your recruiter about your CV and how it is best structured; after all we are the experts in this matter from years of wading through the good and the bad (and the ugly!)

To discuss general careers advice, including opportunities in your location and how best to construct a CV which will get you that job, speak to one of our specialist consultants on 0121 233 5000 / 020 7649 9094 or visit our website www.vgcharles.com

The Pursuit of Happiness

Every so often there comes a point where you have to stop and reflect on things. Many of you reading this blog will be looking forward to a summer holiday, which may be the first time that you’ve ‘properly’ stopped since January 4th. That means that over the last 6 months it is possible that the momentum you’ve built up in your work means that at no point have you paused and thought “well hang on, where am I going here? And is that somewhere that I even want to go to?”

I was recently sent this blog to read by one of my colleagues (http://quitewellintoss.blogspot.com/2011/07/lou-reed-eat-eat-yer-heart-out.html) – I would strongly recommend stopping the clock and casting your eye over it for five minutes. In summary it’s the thoughts of a man who realises just how important it is to recognise what life gives you, and to fully appreciate everything that you have. It’s well written and certainly something which will make you think.

So why do I mention it? Well, take some time to think over your own life. Chances are that there are areas that you wish to improve on. By my own reckoning (and I’m no expert) there are various main ‘parts’ that make-up your life; the importance and emphasis on each will change at various times depending on your circumstances but those ‘parts’ are:-

• family & relationships;
• finances
• health;
• career;
• faith & beliefs;
• hobbies & leisure; and
• ambitions.

Each of us places a different emphasis on each of these areas but generally speaking everybody should have some element of each incorporated into their life. We could introduce another category of ‘general happiness’, but an argument could be made that your happiness is almost a result of your success in each category. Of course the government will tell us that we can even measure this happiness, although we await official confirmation of how this will be worked out and the units of measurements – I’ll keep you posted.

Anyway, let’s take those parts I mentioned and look at what you can control and to what extent.

Health; well there are certain things that you just can’t cover, but healthy eating, regular exercise and perhaps one less glass of wine at that networking event would be a step in the right direction.

Faith & beliefs are personal and would require more than one blog to cover – so far more than 2000 years of ‘discussion’ hasn’t resolved differing opinions on that one.

The career aspect is one which is largely within your control, and your career will have a bearing on your levels of satisfaction relating to both finances and ambitions, and how much time you get to devote to family & relationships and hobbies & leisure. So if you’re not entirely happy with your career, or if you’re finding that it is not rewarding the other parts of your life sufficiently then you owe yourself to have a look at it. If you are working a 50-hour week, which is pretty likely if you’re an associate trying to hit those 1500+ billable hours then you are spending almost half of your wakened life at the office, so if you’re not enjoying it then frankly you need to get out.

Conversely if you are the kind of full-on corporate billing machine who signed up at law school with the full intention of selling yourself to the capitalist dream, yet find yourself in a 9-5 firm where the client base is poor and the equity spread stops at £80k then you may well find that those aspirations and ambitions you had are far from fulfilled.

As the summer holidays start to kick in and people head for sunnier climes then it may be worth spending some time whilst you’re on the beach thinking about where you want to be once you return.

Are you earning the kind of money you think you need to be?

Are you satisfied with your work/life balance?

Can your present firm offer you the prospects which are so crucial to you being able to say “actually, yes, I am absolutely happy with my lot”?

If not then why not speak to someone about resolving this. You owe it to yourself, surely? Who knows, maybe your own ‘perfect day’ could be just around the corner.

To discuss your aspirations and ambitions, and to talk to experts in the market about which type of opportunity is most likely to meet those requirements, call us at VG Charles & Co on 0121 233 5000 / 020 7649 9094 or visit our website www.vgcharles.com

Two Become One

Michael Jackson featuring Slash – Give In To Me. One of the best tracks MJ ever did, and is criminally under-recognised as such.
Queen with David Bowie – Under Pressure. Fantastic stuff. Or at least it was until Vanilla Ice got his hands on the bassline.
Jay Z with Alicia Keys – Empire State of Mind – one of the tracks of 2009 (although it’s also worth checking out the version with just Miss Keys on her own.)
Dire Straits & Sting – Money For Nothing. It’s brilliant. Just don’t admit it in public.

There’s no doubt that sometimes pooling resources can create something greater than the sum of the parts that makes it up. Not always (David Bowie & Mick Jagger’s ‘Dancing In The Street’ anybody?) but often working together can create something quite spectacularly good.

Morecambe & Wise.
Lennon & McCartney.
The Rat Pack.
Laurel & Hardy.
Punch & Judy.
The Chuckle Brothers.

According to a report in The Law Gazette last month (http://www.lawgazette.co.uk/news/top-firms-involved-merger-talks) the trend for firms to look at merging is showing no signs of abating since we last covered the subject in a blog last year (http://vgcharles.blogspot.com/2010/06/to-merge-or-not-to-merge.html). The 2009 figure of 75% of the Top 100 having been approached has been mirrored in 2010 according to a survey which indicated that just over 74% of firms in the Top 200 have had the same conversation in recent times.

What does seem to have changed though is the reason why these conversations have taken place. In 2009 during the immediate post-recession market many of the conversations amongst smaller firms were based upon a recognition that firms need to pool their resources to survive. Now though it is the looming spectre of Alternative Business Structures which appears to be driving practices to look at how they are structured, whether they are set-up to deal with ABSs, and if not then how they can best achieve this.

Recently our business has been involved in brokering a number of these mergers; our vast experience in the legal recruitment market lends itself very well as, just like advising a candidate, the most important aspects remain what the ‘fit’ is, understanding what each side hopes to achieve and therefore which firm(s) represent the best match for doing so.

That specialist knowledge of understanding the individual ethos and ambition of each firm, the working mentality, client base, calibre of lawyer etc is absolutely crucial in ensuring that the merger is on track for success and that the combined entity will work as a fully integrated and functional practice.

So if mergers or an acquisition is something which you are considering at the moment, then what do you need to consider?

- WHY? – what do you hope to achieve from such a move? Is it to boost turnover, to add a new service, gain a presence in a new location or is it simply economies of scale?

- WHO? – you know who you are, what kind of practice you are and the type of person who is typically successful there. Chances are that you will be looking for firms of a similar outlook and working practice, but who fits the bill?

- WHERE? – are you seeking to merge or acquire so that you are not entering a new location ‘cold’, or are you looking to maximise your local presence by going into business with a nearby rival, thus cornering a greater percentage of the market?

- HOW? – well, that’s where we come in! :-)

- WHAT? – this is perhaps something more important in the ABS market than before, but even now we are seeking firms like BLG and Clyde discussing mergers which will create a behemoth of the insurance world. What do you want the final firm to be? An international transatlantic giant or the leading high street practice in town?

These are all questions which both parties need to consider from the outset. However firms should also retain an open-minded stance; often a practice interested in merger talks may be one which doesn’t initially seem to fit the expansion plan, yet just one conversation between the parties can reveal that actually it’s a match made in heaven.

In other cases it is through having such a meeting that it can firm up in the protagonists’ minds exactly what it is they are seeking. As such we work with a number of firms who are not actively pursuing expansion of this nature, but who nonetheless wish to be made aware of any practices who are considering mergers in case this may fit with their long-term and/or opportunist strategy.

Like most things in life you have to buy a ticket to take the ride. Some talks simply won’t go anywhere, but only by talking to people in the market who can put you in touch with the right opportunities do you stand a chance of finding out if that ideal merger partner may be out there.

And remember, nothing ventured nothing gained. Not all collaborations are perfect:- consider Paul McCartney & Stevie Wonder – Ebony & Ivory. Actually, best not.

To discuss possible merger opportunities in the legal market, including in-depth conversations about the strategy and driving factors behind such a move, call one of our specialist consultants at VG Charles & Co on 0121 233 5000 / 020 7649 9094 or visit our website www.vgcharles.com

All Your Eggs In One Basketcase

Pensions. Brilliant stuff. Nothing more cheery than thinking about whether you’ve got enough tucked away to make sure you don’t starve before you die of something else.

As someone who has been looking at pension arrangements lately it’s apparent that you have to try and make sure you have a balanced element of risk when you’re sorting out where to invest. Do you target your fund on those global markets offer a better rate of return, albeit at a higher risk to your money? Or do you instead look at less volatile areas which provide greater security but without the possibility of making any stratospheric gains.

It’s a bit of a balancing act, but generally people will make some effort to spread the risk. Putting some money on those high return areas on the hope of making a quick buck, with other funds in medium-to-low risk markets, spreading the investment to ensure that not all of your eggs are in one basket. That way if one goes down you still have other irons in the fire which you can bring into place.

And what does any of this have to do with the legal recruitment market? Fair point, but stay with me.

When it comes to legal recruitment we are only too aware that for some candidates it can be a wrench to decide to move firms, particularly if they have been with the practice for a number of years. However experience has taught us that the worst thing that you can do is to make a half-baked effort at it, hence when we are working with solicitors, partners and teams who are looking to move we make a point of putting as many serious opportunities in front of them as possible. This isn’t a ‘seeing what sticks’ mindset, but is a carefully considered and strategic approach of matching the candidates’ aspirations with the strategies and ambitions of the various firms.

There is an understandable reluctance amongst partners to be thought of as ‘on the market’ and occasionally they will reject this advice, preferring to only speak to one firm at a time, taking things through to a conclusion and then deciding whether to accept or reject an offer. Good idea?

Nope.

In fact, it’s just about the worst approach you can take.

Look at it this way. You’re booking a holiday; do you a) look at a number of locations, and a number of different accommodation options in those locations, including reading reviews and getting prices? Or do you b) pick one hotel, almost at random, without checking facilities, prices, reviews, what is nearby to keep you occupied, etc. but just turn up there with bags in hand?

Of course you wouldn’t, and that’s only you doing your due diligence for a fortnight of your life; what about the place you are going to spend ten hours a day, five days a week?

Put simply, if you are thinking of putting all of your eggs in one basket then you run the risk of seriously limiting your options. If you have indeed decided that your career needs to move forward then your best choice is to sit down with a legal recruiter and discuss exactly what you are looking for, from size of firm and type of client base through to ambitions and ethos of the practice. Any recruiter worth their salt should then be able to outline a number of firms which match up with your aspirations, and hopefully facilitate meetings based on this.

There are any number of clichés which can be thrown in here along the lines of it’s good to talk/talk is cheap, etc but in principle it is true. Often it can be difficult for people to realise that meeting with a particular firm it is not a legally-binding contract that if they then offer you a job that you have to join them! It is literally a case of talking to a key contact who can tell you more about what the practice is seeking to do which, more often than not means that a firm is a more attractive option than it initially appeared.

Indeed recently we were involved in a team move where two partners were initially reluctant to speak to one particular firm, instead preferring two other practices based on their own preconceptions. Sure enough after discussions with the two preferred options and then later with our suggested firm it turned out that this was in fact the best opportunity for them, a point which was only realised by having conversations of this very nature.

So in conclusion? Well, the choice to only look at one option at a time is a matter of personal choice, and in fairness sometimes there are only one or two firms which do actually represent that move forward which you are seeking. However if you are going to move, make sure that you do it wholeheartedly and explore as many options as you can; if you don’t then you are only limiting your ambitions to your own preconceptions and a certain amount of hearsay.

Your recruiter can then advise you through the process, the offer and the negotiations involved. Unless of course it involves the nitty-gritty of sorting out your pension arrangements, in which case you’re on your own!

If you are currently considering exploring other opportunities within the legal market and would appreciate guidance from career professionals then speak to one of our specialist consultants at VG Charles & Co on 0121 233 5000 / 020 7649 9094 or visit our website www.vgcharles.com

The Recovery Is Go Go Go!!

Has anyone been watching the Formula One this year? Only four races in and already it promises to be a particularly exciting season, particularly if anyone can make inroads into the dominance of Sebastian Vettel’s Red Bull and give him a real run for his money. What has really stood out is the amount of overtaking which has taken place compared to other years where many races have been little more than 24 cars driving round in formation, usually led by a certain Mr M Schumacher.

This year though has been a whole new story, evidenced yesterday by Kobayashi recovering to tenth from the back of the grid, and Mark Webber storming from last to third in China a few weeks back, a recovery which even Lazarus would have been proud of.

Recovery seems to be the buzz word for many of us for some time now. Ever since the credit crunch began and banks started folding most of us in the business world have been anxiously looking for signs of the market and economy improving and strengthening. There have been some false dawns along the way, including the surprise contraction in the economy in the last quarter of 2010, but generally speaking the market has been improving and firms have gone from consolidation mode to now looking at ways in which they can strengthen and improve their situation.

Further evidence of this has recently been supplied by a survey carried out by the Law Society in Birmingham. In 2010 the level of practice fee income rose marginally by some 0.2%, a considerable contrast to a 6.5% drop the previous year, with levels of profit per partner increasing by nearly 20% on the 2009 figures.

The most ringing endorsement of firms’ confidence in the market though has been the level of recruitment enjoyed in the same period, with more than 1000 new members of staff being hired in this time. At an average of around 20 new recruits every week the evidence of recovery is undeniable, with considerable investment being required by firms to facilitate recruitment at this level.

We are therefore at a very interesting time in the legal recruitment market, as this increased confidence coincides with what is always a busy time of year for recruiters – pay review time. For the last few years it has not been as keenly pursued as usual, as the general consensus amongst solicitors has been to hold onto the job that they are in, with the associated security of longevity in the role and redundancy compensation if the position is terminated.

This year though we expect a significant increase in the levels of lawyers looking to talk, as there is the growing realisation that not only are there other (and better) opportunities out there but also that any risk of a swift redundancy in a new position has considerably diminished with levels of work at higher levels than for years. The corporate market in particular is calling out for talented solicitors and with many having been forced to accept reduced hours and pay cuts just to stay in a role it is likely that there will be an increased level of movement in this area.

All round the UK there is a certain level of ‘draw’ which particular legal centres exert on other locations. Like moons and tides, an increase in activity in Birmingham is often reflected by an upturn in Nottingham, Derby and Leicester; heightened levels of instructions in Reading can see increased levels of work in Oxford and Basingstoke. It is therefore logical to assume that this improved level of performance reported in Birmingham will be reflected in other nearby areas, as slowly but surely the world starts to turn again.


Will the market ever get back to the way it was a few years back? Corporate work booming, firms with commercial property work coming out of their ears? Perhaps, although whilst we are moving towards this a recovery at this level may still be a while off.

And a German running away with the Formula One World Championship? Well, some things never change.

To discuss nationwide opportunities in an improving market speak to one of our specialist consultants at VG Charles & Co on 0121 233 5000 or visit our website www.vgcharles.com.