The summer of 2009 has been one of ups and downs. We have placed good quality candidates into good quality positions, both in house and private practice, and had a busier July than we have had in about 3 years. In the last three weeks of August, we had more vacancies into us than for the previous 4 months, and there are definitely signs now that the market is picking up. A couple of conveyancing positions again were posted, although these were not particularly of a good standard, and the focus remains on contentious work.
We have had 17 interviews, 10 job offers and 28 new vacancies since our last newsletter in January. All of these interviews have been for employed positions with salaried roles. Smaller firms appear to be recruiting more than larger firms at present, and this probably relates to the smaller levels of overheads the high street and niche firms have to service. Some frustration on the recruitment side including the Legal Services Commission prevaricating over funding for a couple of clients and leading to the withdrawal of a couple of offers..
In fact whilst redundancies appear to have slowed down, some of the volume and insurance client firms are still laying off staff, and I suspect that this will continue for some time until their accounts are more comfortable. A good time to be a small business I think…
Recruitment is done in waves, and the next wave always starts in September, finishing at half term in October and then starting again January.
www.ten-percent.co.uk/weeklyreport.htm