Legal Business Blogs

Linklaters to hit 20% female partnership as women make up a third of 33-strong promotion round

For the sixth year in a row Linklaters has increased the size of its promotion round, adding 33 lawyers to its partnership.

Eleven of the new partners announced today (11 March) and effective from May are women, surpassing the firm’s 30% annual target and meaning its overall partnership will be 20% female for the first time.

Managing partner Gideon Moore told Legal Business that the result was a validation of the changes the firm was driving through the partnership in terms of diversity and inclusion: ‘We are heading in the direction we wish to, bearing in mind where we started from and the way the partnership evolved. I won’t be satisfied until it’s 50-50.’

As in last year’s 27-strong round, the firm’s corporate practice had the largest intake of partners globally, with nine promoted. Capital markets was second at six, twice as many as last year. Banking saw five lawyers promoted while disputes had three.

‘All of the promotions are client-led,’ said Moore. ‘We don’t start off by saying we will only have a certain number. We look at the quality of the individual and the practice.’

London promotions also increased on last year, with 11 minted compared to ten in 2018.

City-based Charles Turner, Derek Tong and Tom Thorne got the nod in the corporate practice; Matthew Harding and Thomas Waller in banking; Chris Stevenson in disputes and Thomas Quoroll in capital markets. Sinead Casey, John Sheppard, Rahul Manvatkar and Ross Schloeffel were also added to the partnership in employment, pensions, investment funds and projects respectively.

Continental Europe replaced Asia in second place this year, as ten lawyers were promoted on the continent and eight in the firm’s Asian offices.

marco.cillario@legalease.co.uk

Linklaters partner promotions in full:

Christoph Barth, Competition/Antitrust, Dusseldorf

Sinead Casey, Employment, London

Gabriel Silva, Mainstream Corporate, São Paulo

Karen Phang, Mainstream Corporate, Jakarta

Robert Elliot, Mainstream Corporate, Singapore

Claudia Schneider, Mainstream Corporate, Frankfurt

Thomas Broichhausen, Mainstream Corporate, Munich

Charles Turner, Mainstream Corporate, London

Derek Tong, Mainstream Corporate, London

Tom Thorne, Mainstream Corporate, London

Carmen Burgos, Mainstream Corporate, Madrid

John Sheppard, Pensions, London

Alejandro Meca, Tax, Madrid

Adrian Fisher, TMT IP, Singapore

Omar El Sayed, Banking/Corporate, Middle East

Sabine Vorwerk, Banking, Frankfurt

Matthew Harding, Banking, London

Thomas Waller, Banking, London

Jonathan Ching, Banking, New York

Karen Lam, Capital Markets, Hong Kong

Sherry (Jiwei) Cui, Capital Markets, Hong Kong

Kenneth Lam, Capital Markets, Tokyo

Thomas Quoroll, Capital Markets, London

Simon Few, Capital Markets, EMEA

Ugo Orsini, Capital Markets, Milan

Peiying Chua, Financial Regulation, Singapore

Rahul Manvatkar, Investment Funds, London

Crystal Chen, Projects, Hong Kong

Ross Schloeffel, Projects, London

Adolfo Guerrero, Real Estate, Madrid

Brenda DiLuigi, Dispute Resolution, New York

Kerstin Wilhelm, Dispute Resolution, Munich

Chris Stevenson, Dispute Resolution, London