Beyond the Bubble: Russell-Cooke takes on Gunnercooke

Russell-Cooke takes on gunnercooke

London: The consultancy firms had their moment of greatest triumph and also their greatest danger when Covid-19 hit. Triumph, because their dispersed model was vindicated. Danger, because suddenly one of their unique selling points was no longer so unique. ‘Traditional’ firms adapted quickly to home-working, and they also started looking at what other lessons they could learn from the challengers.

Unobtrusive London firm Russell-Cooke is one of those firms. Over the last two years, without doing any publicity at all, it has been growing its own consultancy strand, named Flex, pitching it to recruits as providing all the benefits of a dispersed firm with all the advantages of traditional one.

The financial rewards, calculated on a percentage basis, look similar to what a dispersed firm might offer “but hires get the benefit of the traditional firm infrastructure and especially the promise of being part of a real team, bringing on its juniors and being part of its strategic growth,” says Emma Shipp, who runs the offering. Flex’s consultants have no obligation to be in the office, she says, but are invariably the ones who come in five days a week, feeding off the buzz of the community. They are invited to the annual partner conference and, since many are senior figures within the profession, have strategic insights to offer. For Russell-Cooke, having lawyers working on consultancy terms also offers the ability to expand into new areas that it wouldn’t have risked within the more traditional model.

Flex is now six consultants strong. One is a young lawyer who has a side business on YouTube, but the rest are mostly figures with an established book of business nearing retirement who are also attracted by the idea of knowing their clients will pass into safe hands. Shipp says there is room to hire more, but taking on too many would begin to dilute Russell-Cooke’s culture: she will remain picky about who Flex takes on. That attitude means Russell-Cooke won’t be competing with Gunnercooke or Keystone for scale, but it gives high-quality candidates another option to look at. And it won’t be long before other firms start jumping on the bandwagon.

The consolidation game

Dundee: Back in 2020 The Lawyer noted how the smaller Scottish firms had been growing at a slower pace than their English counterparts. One of those firms was Lindsays, but since then it has piled on the pounds. Revenue at the firm shot up 18 per cent to £20m in 2021/22 and on 30 May the firm will merge with Dundee’s Miller Hendry, bulking the firm up further in that city and adding offices in Perth and Crieff.

Lindsays has merger form, previously combining with Shield & Kyd, MacLachlan & MacKenzie (both 2012), RSB Macdonald (in 2015), Aitken Nairn (2018) and Hadden Rankin (2019). Small individual moves maybe, but slow and steady consolidation of its market. One to watch.

Floating bubbles: the latest moves in the mid-tier

London: Managing partners being poached by other firms may be a thing in Scandinavia but it’s very unusual in Britain so there is a curious arrival at Laytons, where Michael Kashis has joined as managing partner, replacing John Abbott, who is stepping back to focus on his international dispute resolution practice.

Kashis has come from Russell Square firm Bishop & Sewell – where he was also managing partner and had been since 2020. The difference is that the Laytons role will be full-time management, while at Bishop & Sewell Kashis combined the job with being head of corporate and commercial. One can only hope that means the managing partner role at Bishop & Sewell wasn’t so onerous that the firm will be too put out by his departure.

Pass the bubbly: Promotions watch

London: There are some points of note in Fladgate‘s 2023 promotions. Firstly, the firm has elevated its chief operating officer David Rowe to partnership. As we noted in the last Beyond the Bubble, COOs are increasingly in demand in the mid-tier and Fladgate’s elevation of Rowe after only two years in post shows a keenness to tie him down. “David Rowe’s impact on our strategic progress since he joined in 2021 has been significant and his appointment as a partner is recognition of that contribution and his ability to support the implementation of the firm’s ambitious strategy,” says managing partner Grant Gordon.

Fladgate also promoted five associates to partner: Armel Elaudais (real estate disputes), Nadia Osborne (dispute resolution), Nathan Carter-Smith (real estate), Sophie Burke (corporate) and Adrian Mawlabaux (funds). The most notable of these is Mawlabaux, who left school at 16, joined a barristers’ chambers as a clerk, and paralegalled at Freshfields before joining Fladgate in 2008 as a Chartered Legal Executive. Congratulations on achieving partnership by such as route are well in order.

Bubble and squeak: tales from outside the Square Mile

Raiders of the lost award

Manchester: Winning an award is always worthy of a celebration, especially if you’ve been waiting nine years for the recognition. So, when TLT won ‘Law Firm of the Year’ at the Manchester Legal Awards in June 2022, having opened its office in 2013, the team was well within its right to pop the bubbly.

But one too many tipples were consumed: the team neglected to keep track of the heavy embossed glass trophy and it vanished into the night. But all was not lost. The team recently got a call to say their missing trophy had been found… in Stockport.

It was not simply a question of posting it back to the office, however. The finder said they would hold the award hostage unless TLT let them pitch an idea to the firm. In gratitude for finding the prize, the team agreed to the mystery person’s conditions. Nine months down the line and TLT has its trophy back and the finder (hem hem, original thief? We couldn’t comment) is now in talks with the firm’s business development team. 

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