The targets include having 20% female partners; at least 30% women in each promotion round; and 30% of women in its partnership in non-elected leadership roles.
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Allen & Overy (A&O) confirmed today (4 May) that it has been running a performance pilot scheme for the last six months, dropping traditional annual appraisals in a new approach to performance management.
The pilot scheme, focused on feedback and dialogue as tools to strengthen development and performance, has been running since October 2016 and currently involves 500 fee-earners and business staff across several practice groups and support functions in London, Singapore and the Middle East.
Given the positive feedback, particularly in engaging female associates on their career development, the firm is planning to roll out a second phase of the pilot later in 2017 involving more people, offices and practice areas worldwide.
A&O global HR director Sasha Hardman said: ‘We are always looking to evolve what we do to ensure that we have the best possible platforms for the development of our people. We are very pleased that the pilot has been received so positively and are using the feedback from it to enhance our approach and look forward to extending and developing it for the second phase.’
Last month A&O made up 24 partners worldwide, including 10 in London, with banking, international capital markets and corporate each seeing three promotions in the City in an increased global round. However, only two women were made up to partnership this year, making up just 8% of total promotions.
As a response, the firm pledged to achieve better gender balance continuing to work towards the existing target of at least 20% female partners by 2020, and new targets including ensuring 30% of yearly partner promotions will be women and achieve 30% women to non-elected leadership roles by 2020.
In a continuing bid to remain competitive, earlier this year Legal Business reported A&O broke lockstep again for a New York finance team, about six months after it used its rejigged remuneration system to bring in a four partner leveraged finance team.
georgiana.tudor@legalease.co.uk
Allen & Overy (A&O) has made up 10 partners in London with banking, international capital markets and corporate each seeing three promotions in the City in an increased global round of 24.
Just two women were made up to partnership in this year’s round, making up just 8% of total promotions. Last year 29% of the firm’s partner promotions were women, down from 2015 when 41% of females made the cut.
The promotion round is the largest since 2008. Last year the firm promoted 21 in a reduced round with almost half the promotions made in the firm’s banking team.
Corporate made up the bulk of the firm’s promotions this year with the practice gaining eight promotions. Six were made up in banking, and four were made up in both litigation and international capital markets. Three were promoted in both Hong Kong and Sydney with A&O’s Amsterdam, Brussels, Dusseldorf, Frankfurt, Istanbul, Jakarta, Madrid and Prague offices all receiving one new partner.
A&O managing partner Andrew Ballheimer (pictured) said: ‘We’ve had a very busy year and are investing strongly across our network. Following a string of high-profile lateral hires, it’s fantastic to be able to promote some of our most senior lawyers to meet client demand.’
There was a notable absence of partner promotions in the US where the firm has made a number of notable lateral hires this year. A&O hired a three partner finance and securities team from Paul Hastings including heavy hitter Bill Schwitter, appointed former Morvillo Abramowitz Grand Iason & Anello partner Eugene Ingoglia to its investigations and litigation practice in New York and brought on Cadwalader, Wickersham & Taft litigation partners Gregory Mocek and Anthony Mansfield to its Washington DC office.
madeleine.farman@legalease.co.uk
Allen & Overy partner promotions in full:
Frits Gerritzen, Amsterdam, litigation
Peter van Dyck, Brussels, corporate
Murad Daghles, Dusseldorf, corporate
Jan Erik Windthorst, Frankfurt, litigation
Michael Jacobs, Hong Kong, corporate
Agnes Tsang, Hong Kong, ICM
Patrick Wong, Hong Kong, banking
Joe Clinton, Istanbul, banking
Michael Tardif, Jakarta, banking
Joel Ferguson, London, banking,
Neil Sinha, London, banking
Vanessa Xu, London, banking
Matthew Appleton, London, corporate
Peter Banks, London, corporate
Dominic Long, London, corporate
Tom Constance, London, ICM
Daniel Fletcher, London, ICM
Tom Roberts, London, ICM
Nick Saner, London, real estate
Javier Castresana, Madrid, litigation
Prokop Verner, Prague, corporate
Connell O’Neill, Sydney, corporate
Jason Gray, Sydney, litigation
Ka Sen Wong, Sydney, tax
In February it emerged A&O used its bonus pool to hire a three-partner Paul Hastings team. The US firm’s leveraged finance head Bill Schwitter joined A&O’s New York office as the firm’s global co-head of high-yield alongside partner Michael Chernick and capital markets partner Jeffrey Pellegrino.
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Slaughter and May, Allen & Overy (A&O), Clifford Chance (CC) have all picked up advisory roles in the UK government’s £11.8bn sale of buy-to-let mortgages from failed lender Bradford & Bingley.
Slaughters is advising Treasury entity UK Asset Resolution (UKAR), with a team led by finance partner Guy O’Keefe (pictured) and corporate partner Craig Cleaver.
Cleary Gottlieb Steen & Hamilton was also special US counsel, advising UKAR alongside Slaughters, with a team led by international capital markets partner Pierre-Marie Boury in London.
A&O and CC are advising the buyers, Blackstone and Prudential, respectively. CC’s team is led by structured debt partner Maggie Zhao alongside M&A partner Hilary Evenett.
The government took control of the failed bank’s £50bn loan book back in 2008, while Bradford & Bingley’s £20bn savings unit and branches were bought by Santander bank.
Slaughters advised UKAR in 2008 when a large proportion of Bradford & Bingley’s portfolio was rescued, while Cleary Gottlieb Steen & Hamilton and Linklaters advised private equity company TPG on its acquisition during Bradford & Bingley’s collapse.
Slaughters and Linklaters also landed major roles in 2015 advising on the government’s record-breaking £13bn sale of former Northern Rock mortgages during the financial crisis.
Separately, Slaughters also acted for UKAR when the government sold a £13bn asset portfolio to Cerberus Capital Management in 2015.
georgiana.tudor@legalease.co.uk
Mishcon de Reya, Allen & Overy (A&O) and Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer were among the major winners at the 2017 Legal Business Awards, with Macfarlanes’ senior partner Charles Martin recognised as Management Partner of the Year.
Mishcon (pictured) was named Law Firm of the Year for the second time in five years, winning the most coveted award for what is been a startling run over the last decade (as can be seen in our December cover feature ‘The USP – What is Mishcon’s secret formula?‘.
A&O was of the one night’s main winners, picking up two awards: Competition Team of the Year and Legal Innovator of the Year, thanks to the successful launch of its MarginMatrix product and collaboration with Deloitte. Meanwhile, Freshfields picked up one of the most sought-after awards, Private Equity Team of the Year, for its role advising Advent International on the £1.5bn sale of the Priory Group to Acadia Healthcare.
Our Lawyer of the Year award this year was given to commemorate the work and life of the late Frances Murphy of Slaughter and May, one of the finest City M&A partners of her generation.
In other key practice categories, Clifford Chance was selected as Corporate Team of the Year for its role advising National Australia Bank on the three-and-a-half year-long demerger and subsequent listing of CYBG; while Ropes & Gray won Finance Team of the Year for advising Virgin Media on two innovative transactions. In one of the most competitive slots, Latham & Watkins was named US Law Firm of the Year.
Gowling WLG was a joint winner alongside Hogan Lovells in the Real Estate Team of the Year category, then returned to the stage to pick up the CSR Programme of the Year award for its work on establishing the Suited For Success charity.
Our disputes category was split for the first time this year, with Boies, Schiller & Flexner named Commercial Litigation Team of the Year for obtaining the first summary judgment from the Financial List in a landmark case for Barclays, while Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom picked up the International Arbitration Team of the Year award for securing victory for the Republic of South Sudan in its ICSID dispute with Sudapet Company.
Other major awards saw Virgin Media’s legal team named In-House Team of the Year for its role in the success of two major initiatives for the company in the last year, while Scotland’s leading independent, Brodies, picked up National/Regional Firm of the Year after a very strong 2016.
The awards were presented to 900 guests in a gala ceremony last night (23 March) hosted by renowned journalist and newscaster Alastair Stewart. The event was preceded by a reception to mark the launch of this year’s GC Powerlist report.
The winners were selected by an external judging panel comprising the following senior general counsel: Nilema Bhakta-Jones, group legal director of Ascential Group; Claire Chapman, general counsel (GC) and company secretary of Daily Mail and General Trust; Kate Cheetham, general counsel at Lloyds Banking Group; Kirsty Cooper, group GC and company secretary at Aviva; Claire Debney, director of legal strategy at Shire; Chris Fowler, GC UK Commercial for BT; FT GC Dan Guildford; Geoffrey Timms, GC and company secretary at Legal & General Group; Zoopla Property Group GC Ned Staple; Nigel Paterson, general counsel at Dixons Carphone; Nyeem Syed, assistant GC, financial & risk at Thomson Reuters; and Tony Williams of Jomati as well as Alex Novarese and Mark McAteer from Legal Business.
Our May edition will include a full report of the night. For more details on the awards, click here.
mark.mcateer@legalease.co.uk
Legal Business Awards 2017 – The Winners
Bristows – TMT Team of the Year
Ropes & Gray – Finance Team of the Year
Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom – International Arbitration Team of the Year
Ashurst – Restructuring Team of the Year
Allen & Overy – Competition Team of the Year
CMS Cameron McKenna – Energy and Infrastructure Team of the Year
Boies, Schiller & Flexner- Commercial Litigation Team of the Year
Irwin Mitchell – Private Client Team of the Year
Bond Dickinson – Insurance Team of the Year
Clifford Chance – Corporate Team of the Year
Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer – Private Equity Team of the Year
Gowling WLG/Hogan Lovells – Real Estate Team of the Year
Three Crowns – Boutique of the Year
Frances Murphy, Slaughter and May – Lawyer of the Year
Gowling WLG – CSR Programme of the Year
Vieira de Almeida – International Firm of the Year
Ahsan Gulabkhan, Virgin Atlantic – Rising Star In-House Counsel of the Year
Virgin Media – In-House Team of the Year
Charles Martin, Macfarlanes – Management Partner of the Year
Latham & Watkins – US Law Firm of the Year
Allen & Overy – Legal Innovator of the Year
Linklaters – Legal Technology Team of the Year
Brodies – National/Regional Firm of the Year
Mishcon de Reya – Law Firm of the Year
Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer and Allen & Overy (A&O) have both kept on 31 members of their spring trainee intake, with retention rates of 84% and 82% respectively.
Freshfields will keep 84% of its group of 37 trainees – 31 offers were made to the cohort with all agreeing to stay on as newly-qualified (NQ) lawyers. The rate is up slightly on last year’s spring retention figure of 82% when the firm again kept on 31 trainees out of a group of 38. The firm offered 33 of 38, or 87%, of its trainees places.
Also posting its trainee retention figures this month is A&O which posted a spring retention rate of 82%, compared to a rate of 91% this time last year. The Magic Circle firm held on to 31 applicants after 32 of the group of 36 received offers from a cohort of 38.
The results follow Slaughter and May’s 100% retention of its trainees, keeping all 25 due to qualify in March. Slaughter and May, Freshfields and A&O have outshined Clifford Chance (CC) which has kept on just 31 of its 46 trainees or 67% of its cohort. CC had 43 out of 46 apply for a contract, it made 33 offers and retained 31. Comparatively, CC retained 91% of its trainees in spring 2015, and 80% in spring 2016.
Meanwhile, Simmons & Simmons claims an 80% retention rate, offering 12 trainees in its spring cohort an NQ role. The firm said 14 out of 15 applied for a position, 12 offers were made and accepted.
This time last year, the firm announced nine trainees had gone through the qualification round while it later emerged there were actually 13 trainees on the intake, which gave Simmons a lower intake rate of 54%, rather than that declared of 78%.
madeleine.farman@legalease.co.uk
Allen & Overy‘s (A&O) global head of dispute resolution Tim House is to become senior partner of the US and Latin America as the Magic Circle firm continues its heavy push into the region.
House will replace current managing partner David Krischer, who will remain at the firm, on 1 May and will be based in A&O’s New York office. It was announced in November the firm’s US senior partner, Kevin O’Shea, would leave for Milbank Tweed Haley & McCloy. Both Dave Lewis and Barbara Stettner will will head up the New York office and the Washington DC office respectively.
House will continue as the firm’s global head of dispute resolution, which he was appointed to two-and-a half years ago, for the rest of his four year term.
House has experience litigating and resolving complex disputes or managing investigations with much of his work being multi-jurisdictional. He will continue to do client work sourced from UK contacts but will not be a US lawyer.
A well-respected name at A&O, House ran for the role of senior partner in the firm’s leadership election last year. He was beaten to the post by longstanding former managing partner Wim Dejonghe, who now stands alongside managing partner Andrew Ballheimer. Former banking co-head Stephen Kensell, who left last year for Latham & Watkins, and Paris-based competition partner Michel Struys also ran for the post.
House told Legal Business: ‘I see my role as a combination of building the business and coordinating among all the partners and amongst all the practice groups in the way we present ourselves to clients and the way we serve their needs in the US and Latin America.
‘I am going to be continuing to do client work. Monthly I will be back in the UK, partly to serve UK-based clients, but also partly in my continuing role as global litigation head because the UK is a large part of that practice.’
House’s move to the firm’s US offices follows the hire of investigations and litigation partners Gregory Mocek and Anthony Mansfield from Cadwalader, Wickersham & Taft in January and Eugene Ingoglia from Morvillo in February. Mocek and Mansfield join A&O’s Washington DC office while Ingoglia will be based in New York.
The firm’s litigation group was bulked up with the hire of a four partner London IP litigation team from Simmons & Simmons last year. A&O confirmed Mark Heaney and David Stone would join the firm in September, following the hire of Marc Döring and Marjan Noor earlier that year.
A&O has aggressively grown its finance practice in the US with a thre- partner Paul Hastings team making up its sixth lateral in the country since January. The lockstep-breaking hire includes former Paul Hastings leveraged finance head Bill Schwitter who will join A&O’s New York office and will become the firm’s global co-head of high-yield. He joins alongside high-yield partner Michael Chernick and capital markets partner Jeffrey Pellegrino.
The team was not the first the Magic Circle firm had broken its lockstep for in the past 12 months. A&O hired a four partner team in New York in July last year. The team is led by global co-head of leveraged finance Scott Zemser, who joined with Alan Rockwell and Judah Frogel from White & Case. Rajani Gupta came to A&O from Proskauer Rose, while associate Todd Koretzky joined from Milbank. Koretzky was made up to partner in the move.
madeleine.farman@legalease.co.uk
Allen & Overy (A&O) has broken lockstep again for a New York finance team hired last week, about six months after it used its rejigged remuneration system to bring in a four partner leveraged finance team.
Legal Business understands the firm broke its lockstep for the hire of a three partner finance and securities team from Paul Hastings including heavy hitter Bill Schwitter.
While the firm declined to comment on which hires the lockstep was broken for or how much they would be paid, it is a clear statement of the firm’s ambition and commitment to the US market.
A spokesperson for the firm said: ‘We don’t comment on individual partners’ remuneration packages, but would point out that we are confident that our compensation system provides us with the flexibility and firepower we need in the marketplace. This group of appointments is indicative of the fact that we can compete with US firms financially.’
Schwitter will become the firm’s global co-head of high-yield and arrives alongside high-yield partner Michael Chernick and capital markets partner Jeffrey Pellegrino. The new recruits bring A&O’s New York leveraged finance partner headcount to 12.
The new team follows A&O’s lockstep-breaking hire of a four partner team in New York in July last year. The team is led by global co-head of leveraged finance Scott Zemser, who joined with Alan Rockwell and Judah Frogel from White & Case. Rajani Gupta came to A&O from Proskauer Rose, while associate Todd Koretzky joined from Milbank, Tweed, Hadley & McCloy. Koretzky was made up to partner in the move.
A&O introduced a performance-related bonus pool, separate to its lockstep, to both help retain and bring in leading talent in 2015. The firm’s overall lockstep remained unaltered running from 20 points, up two points each year, to a maximum of 50.
In terms of rewarding lateral hires with the bonus, the sponsoring partner will put a proposal to a committee which will then decide whether or not to award the lateral with extra points. This remains subject to a full partnership vote when bringing in any lateral hire.
A&O banking co-head Philip Bowden (pictured) told Legal Business earlier in the year: ‘Our challenge is that we have the leading finance practice everywhere except New York, but we are actively involved in follow-up investment. The focus for the US piece is still in New York. We are looking at potential lateral hires in restructuring, high yield and leveraged finance.’
madeleine.farman@legalease.co.uk
Read more: ‘The Finance View – A&O’s new practice chiefs on repositioning the City’s top finance shop’
Allen & Overy (A&O) has continued its US push picking up a three partner finance and securities team from Paul Hastings. The team brings A&O’s US lateral hire count to six since the start of the year.
Former Paul Hastings leveraged finance head Bill Schwitter will join A&O’s New York office and will become the firm’s global co-head of high-yield. He joins alongside high-yield partner Michael Chernick and capital markets partner Jeffrey Pellegrino. The new recruits bring A&O’s New York leveraged finance partner headcount to 12.
Schwitter primarily focuses on high-yield bonds and private equity while Chernick has combined syndicated lending and high-yield bond expertise. Pellegrino advises on high-yield bonds and a wide variety of other debt and equity capital markets transactions.
Senior partner Wim Dejonghe (pictured) said: ‘This strategic hire of three leading New York finance partners demonstrates our commitment to the continued expansion in the US across key practice areas. Our ability to hire these highly-regarded attorneys in such a fiercely competitive market shows the increasing attractiveness of our New York finance platform.’
A&O co-head of global leveraged finance Scott Zemser: ‘I don’t think there’s been a leveraged finance team of eight partners of this level and now 12 leveraged finance partners in total in New York that have made a move like this either side of the border.’
The hires follow A&O’s lockstep-breaking hire of a four partner team in New York in July last year. The team is led by global co-head of leveraged finance Scott Zemser, who joined with Alan Rockwell and Judah Frogel from White & Case. Rajani Gupta came to A&O from Proskauer Rose, while associate Todd Koretzky joined from Milbank, Tweed, Hadley & McCloy. Koretzky was made up to partner in the move.
Earlier this month the firm announced the hire of Eugene Ingoglia to its investigations and litigation practice in New York. In January A&O confirmed Gregory Mocek and Anthony Mansfield would join the Magic Circle firm’s Washington DC office from Cadwalader, Wickersham & Taft.
Read more: ‘The Finance View – A&O’s new practice chiefs on repositioning the City’s top finance shop’
