Legal Recruitment Newsletter for Employers August 2nd – Ten-Percent Legal Recruitment
Contents
* Legal Job Market Report
* Candidate Update 1st August
* Shocking Working Conditions in a Law Firm
* Register Vacancies – Locum or Permanent
* £60 Per Month Recruitment Scheme
Legal Job Market Report August 1st
Late June and early July have been pretty slow months generally, although this is not unexpected. We have had Wimbledon, Euro 2012 and the build up to the Olympics taking place, all of which result in very little thought being given to the exciting topic of legal recruitment and taking on new staff!
It is now exactly 12 months since we launched our £3,600 for 5 years unlimited recruitment service and we have seen a very enthusiastic take up. Clients who have used us for many years probably account for about 25% of our current membership but plenty of new clients have joined. We hope to reach 100 member firms very shortly. Cost savings to our 60+ firms are already estimated to be around £225,000. Over 60% of members undertake LSC funded work in some capacity and 33% have less than 2 partners. The service is restricted to firms with less than 100 staff.
In July 2012 we had 69 new candidates register with us, which is the lowest amount of new registrations since 2008. Good news? Possibly. It may have something to do with the slow down in recruitment this month and also in the number of redundancies currently being seen.
Again we have expanded further on the locum side and now have over 750 locums registered with us. We have seen a large increase this month in the use of contractors (aka locums) by law firms, which appears to be the new trend.
Register Vacancies – Locum or Permanent
£60 Per Month Recruitment Scheme
There are over 9,250 lawyers registered with us looking for permanent work and 750 locums available for assignments in all areas of the country. Register vacancies on our website, email cv@ten-percent.co.uk or call 0207 127 4343.
Selection of Permanent Candidates registered in the past week:
DUTY SOLICITOR, Leicester/Northants. Prison Law Supervisor. Ref 31071852.
CHILD CARE/FAMILY SOLICITOR. LONDON. 9 months PQE. Ref 31071653
HOUSING LSC SUPERVISOR. Consultant or Salaried. Greater London. Ref 31071218
CRIME DUTY SOLICITOR. Freelance sought. North West England. Ref 30072126
RESIDENTIAL CONVEYANCING EXECUTIVE.15 years exp. Leicestershire. Ref 30072016
DUTY SOLICITOR, HCA WITH CC TRIALS EXPERIENCE. Freelance. London. Ref 28071820.
COMMERCIAL PROPERTY AND LITIGATION SOLICITOR. Leicester. 3 years PQE. Ref 26071606
EMPLOYMENT SOLICITOR HERTFORDSHIRE, ENFIELD AND NORTH LONDON. Senior Solicitor, over 3 years PQE. Contentious and non-contentious, applicant and respondent work. Marketing and networking ideas. Ref 23072135.
LITIGATION SOLICITOR NORTH LONDON, HERTS. 3 years PQE. Civil, Property and Employment Litigation, plus Family Law. Ref 20071314.
PERSONAL INJURY FEE EARNER TEAM LEADER, KENT AND LONDON. 7 years experience. RTA, Costs, EL, PL and OL. Ref 20071107.
CONVEYANCING SOLICITOR, BEDFORDSHIRE. Good training background, 2 years experience. £25k salary. Ref 190723023.
MHRT, CRIME AND FAMILY SOLICITOR WITH HRA, NEWCASTLE AND NORTH EAST. 10+ years PQE. Duty Solicitor. Ref 19070750
FAMILY AND CARE SOLICITOR. MILTON KEYNES. 1 year PQE. LSC and privately funded. Ref 18072148.
LEGAL CASHIER. SOMERSET AND BRISTOL. 4 years experience. Ref 18071959.
CRIME SOLICITOR, VHCC A, HCA AND DUTY. SOUTH WEST ENGLAND, LAKE DISTRICT AND THE MIDLANDS. 10 years PQE. Location more important than salary. Ref 18070922
LEGAL CASHIER. LONDON. 2 years exp. Tikit software plus others. Ref 16072118
Selection of Locum Candidates available:
23071751 Conveyancing Solicitor. Midlands. 5 years PQE.
20071027 Commercial Property, Wills & Probate and Conveyancing Solicitor. National coverage. £30 per hour.
23071236 Family Locum. National coverage. 20 years. Available for selected dates through August.
20071457 Fraud and White Collar Crime Locum. 15 years. Hourly rate £50.
19071700 Conveyancing Locum. London, Home Counties. Available from 6th August.
28061259 Wills and Probate Locum. Nationwide coverage.
03071419 Conveyancing Locum. Midlands, Shropshire and Cheshire.
22052001 Conveyancing and Personal Injury Locum. £25 per hour neg. Midlands, Wales, NW.
22051953 Residential Conveyancing. Cambridge + 30 miles. £25 per hour neg.
22051539 Housing and Civil Litigation. Greater London. £25 per hour neg.
22051512 Commercial Contracts £250-400 per day. London
22051451 Civil & Commercial Litigation. Surrey & London. £25 per hour neg.
22051449 Personal Injury (Claimant) and Civil Litigation. £20 per hour. Home Counties.
22051302 Family Locum. Northampton, Midlands and London. £20 per hour.
22050910 Residential and Commercial Conveyancing. Greater London. £20 per hour neg.
23071153 IP and Commercial Litigation Fee Earner Greater London. Fee Earner with 20 years experience.
Register Vacancies – Locum or Permanent
£60 Per Month Recruitment Scheme
Shocking Working Conditions in a Law Firm
We recently spoke to a solicitor who was dealing with unbearable conditions at work, but with a familiar story to us.
This particular candidate works in a law firm where they have:
1) No staff perks at all.
2) No days out, meals out or any staff events.
3) No staff induction when you join the firm, no pay rises and no annual appraisals.
4) No words of encouragement at any time from any other member of staff during this person’s time at the firm (well over 5 years).
5) No social events at all amongst any staff whether organised by the firm or by the staff.
6) A process whereby if someone requests annual leave, one of the partners formally speaks to the employee to determine whether they are going for a job interview.
7) If a complaint about a manager’s behaviour is made then the person who has made the complaint is usually dismissed within 3 weeks.
8) A reasonable salary is paid in line with other firms, but the firm expects a level of billable hours that is next to impossible without working a 60 hour week.
9) An expectation that each employee will work for at least 10 hours per day and not leave the office before 7pm each evening. Work has to be taken home each weekend.
10) Work reviewed by email and only negative points highlighted.
This is not a smaller sized high street practice and neither is it an LSC funded firm – ie they don’t do legal aid work – which I think gives some firms an excuse of sorts for this type of behaviour when hourly rates can be £45 per hour and stress levels permanently high!
Some firms seem to have got very big very quickly on the back of tenders etc.. but have absolutely no idea how to treat their staff. The partners themselves under immense pressure because of the level of tender they have pitched at and in order to achieve the levels required under the tender they have to work both themselves and their staff to the bone.
This almost inevitably results in totally unacceptable working practices. Why law firms think they can get away with this I have no idea, but I see it so many times. The behaviour being exhibited by the partner in charge of the person I coached recently is nothing short of bullying (constant criticism, telephone calls at weekends to check on work, shouting at employees etc..), and if a client had gone to see that partner complaining of behaviour like this then no doubt he would be advising them to take a tribunal case against their employers.
Of course there are plenty of extremely good law firms who treat their employees with respect and dignity and have a good relationship with the local community.
If you exhibit signs of behaviour similar to the above and are reading this, please stop and think. Not only do you make your employees’ lives a misery, in the long term it also makes your life pretty awful as well. Think about the benefit you will get out of being nice to your staff. Friendly smiles all round, harder working staff, committed and loyal employees….
Jonathan Fagan – MD of Ten-Percent Legal Recruitment
Register Vacancies – Locum or Permanent
£60 Per Month Recruitment Scheme
Legal Recruitment News is produced by Ten-Percent Legal Recruitment – you can view all versions of the e-newsletter at www.legal-recruitment.co.uk. Ten-Percent Legal Recruitment was established in 2000 and donates 10% of profits to charity, hence the name.
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