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  • November 12, 2008 |

    The pursuit of happiness

    As a specialist on happiness in the workplace, I have worked in a wide variety of sectors. Out of all the clients I have sat across the table from, lawyers have been consistently the most unhappy.The current economic climate is hardly likely to allay this melancholy. Furthermore, a recent study by recruitment consultancy Badenoch & Clark found that more than a fifth of law firms have had to lay off employees as a result of the current economic -climate. Worries over finances are likely to get worse in January when firms have to pay their partnership tax bills.

    1 minute read

  • November 10, 2008 |

    Cads and Shearman shrink as US firms' growth slows

    Staff growth at America's largest law firms slowed in 2008, according to new research, with a host of major firms contracting in the face of the ailing economy. The National Law Journal's 250 survey, a closely-watched annual snapshot of staffing at the US's largest law firms, shows the group added 4.3% more lawyers over the last 12 months, down on the 5.6% growth in 2007.The 2007 gains represented the largest increase in lawyer numbers since 2001, when numbers ballooned by 8.2%. In 2006, law firm growth was 4%, while in 2005, it was 4.4%.DLA Piper held its position at the top of the list, with a total of 3,785 lawyers. It grew by 4.5% in 2008.

    1 minute read

  • November 6, 2008 |

    Lawyers predict top business litigation issues for President-Elect Obama

    Most lawyers don't keep a crystal ball in their office, but if pressed, some will take a crack at forecasting the future. We asked a selection of litigators…

    1 minute read

  • November 5, 2008 |

    Analysis: Pulling it together

    DLA Piper has always been a firm in a hurry. In the mid-1980s Nigel Knowles, now co-chief executive of the firm, was busy earning his management stripes running Dibb Lupton Broomhead's office in Doncaster.Since then, Knowles - who became managing partner of the firm in 1996 - has been gambling DLA Piper's future on an unrelenting diet of growth and international expansion. First, a merger with Alsop Wilkinson (the firm that put the 'A' in DLA) delivered greater critical mass in London. Then came expansion in Europe, first through an alliance with local practices and later by opening DLA's own offices.

    1 minute read

  • November 5, 2008 |

    Freshfields, Ashurst take flight on Lufthansa's €400m BMI bid

    Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer and Ashurst have landed lead roles in Lufthansa's bid to take a controlling stake in UK airline BMI, in a deal valued at a reported €400m (£314m).Freshfields won an instruction from the German national airline, which announced last week that it is to take a further 50% stake in BMI. London-based corporate partner Sundeep Kapila led the team for the magic circle firm.The firm has advised Lufthansa regularly in the past, including on the establishment of a freight airline with DHL Express in 2007.

    1 minute read

  • November 5, 2008 |

    States of mind

    News reached The Diary this week that international behemoth Jones Day has decided it needs to hand out a few life lessons to its awfully British lawyers. It appears that chivalry is well and truly dead, with associates being sent on courses to become less self-effacing - 'more American' if you will - to harness their inner business development machine.

    1 minute read

  • November 3, 2008 |

    Pinsents retains top spot in AIM client rankings

    Pinsent Masons and LG have cemented their positions as lead advisers to the largest number of clients on London's Alternative Investment Market (AIM) in the last quarter. The fourth quarter update from data provider Hemscott sees Pinsents leading the rankings, picking up two extra AIM clients over the last quarter to take the firm's tally to 61.LG bagged one extra client on the previous quarter to bring the firm's total roster of AIM clients up to 54.

    1 minute read

  • November 3, 2008 |

    SRA approves new work-based learning scheme

    The Solicitors Regulation Authority (SRA) has approved the Oxford Institute of Legal Practice and LawNet for its revamped work-based learning scheme launched earlier this year. The Oxford Institute - which is part of Oxford Brookes University - and LawNet, the national network for mid-size firms, put in a joint proposal to become an assessment organisation for work-based learning that will see them take on 11 trainee solicitors who are not necessarily suited to the traditional training contract.Under the scheme, the Oxford Institute will help trainees prepare a development plan, review their progress against SRA outcomes and provide a final assessment while LawNet operates the training programme.

    1 minute read

  • October 31, 2008 |

    It's bonus time

    Since bonuses were introduced by law firms in the late 1990s as a way to limit the long-term effects of salary inflation, amounts paid out - and the hoops that lawyers have to jump through in order to get their hands on the cash - have varied wildly between firms. Some firms give tens of thousands of pounds to lawyers regardless of individual performance, while others require Olympian levels of all-round commitment in return for sums that could probably be more easily obtained through a few after hours' shifts at the local pub.We take a look behind the main bonus systems operating at the major City and regional firms and assess what the future of bonuses in the legal world is likely to be.

    1 minute read

  • October 29, 2008 | International Edition

    SJ Berwin helps Fyffes escape EC fine

    SJ Berwin's competition team has scored a victory for banana supplier client Fyffes as an investigation by the European Commission into price fixing comes to a close. SJ Berwin competition head Stephen Kon led the case for Fyffes, which learned this month (15 October) that it has escaped a fine following a three-year cartel investigation into the banana industry.

    1 minute read