Developing robust and effective talent pipelines is vital for any legal firm looking to grow, or indeed not looking to fall behind the competition. However, according to research from Lee Hecht Harrison, a worrying 30% of employers describe their pipeline as poor or non-existent. But why is building long term relationships with potential employees so important and how can legal firms do it effectively?

The issue is particularly important in the current market because it’s becoming increasingly difficult to find and recruit good people, at a time when a number of sectors, including law, are not only suffering from skills shortages, but the uncertainty surrounding Brexit is impacting hiring too. And in order to ensure your firm doesn’t reach a stage where it can’t find the talent it requires, the best practice is to build pipelines for all the areas you may potentially need staff in the short and long term future.

The importance of employer brand

By determining the gaps between available and needed talent, firms can identify the most effective strategies for acquiring and developing those individuals. After all, it’s not easy to tap into and engage with talent pools if they have no idea who you are or what you can do for them. In order to build up this relationship, professionals need to recognise and engage with your employer brand, which takes time. It can’t simply be done overnight.

By building an effective pipeline, your firm can shorten the length of time needed to fill positions, because it will likely already have a ‘warm’ relationship with people, meaning you won’t have to recruit from a standing start. It can also help you to engage with the enormous pool of passive talent in the UK. By developing a pipeline into your organisation you can engage with individuals who would be compatible with your firm, but aren’t necessarily ready to move right now.

Identifying future talent gaps

Another significant benefit of strategic recruitment like this is that it allows you to plan for your talent needs not just now, but years into the future. It’s highly likely that your firm could diversify and break into new specialisms or geographical locations, and employing professionals to work in these new departments and locations requires careful planning. If your firm plans to move into litigation, for example, you can build up relationships with talent in this field way before you’ll ever actually need to employ them. This means that when the time does come round to recruit, you will be prepared and ready, rather than scrabbling about looking to promote yourself to potential employees. It also allows you to gain a much greater insight into the people that you’re hiring and whether they would be a good cultural fit for your firm. Anyone can come across well in an interview, but by engaging and keeping a close on eye on the people in your pipeline, you’ll be able to see if they really would be a good match for your firm.

To read more insights from the team take a look at our other blogs. And if you’re seeking a recruitment partner we should be talking. Get in touch today to see how we can help your firm.

There’s no doubt that recruitment in the legal profession today is very different than it was a decade or two ago. Firms have had to adapt to new hiring processes – online communities, digital meet-ups and candidate data all play a significant role in today’s recruitment.

And with so many different aspects now to consider, the lure of using a big recruitment agency is appealing; the legwork is done for you, the burden is taken away from your HR department, and in the past it’s proved an effective way to access large pools of available candidates.

Yet all this can come at a cost – aggressive third-party recruiters, increasing placement rates and commission fees, and dealing with recruiters that are only interested in fulfilling their activity quotas pose a potential risk when working with a large recruitment agency.

So, what if using a recruitment giant wasn’t the only option besides taking on the recruiting yourself? What if you could benefit from a more personal touch in the hiring process, enabling you to find and attract unique top legal talent that could really help your firm excel?
Here’s why you don’t have to settle for using the big recruitment firms:

• Jobs boards are universal – despite what you may hear, jobs boards are accessible for all, and there’s no reason why you need to rely on the biggest firms to advertise for you. Don’t forget that a cleverly written, engaging job description will help you stand out amongst hundreds of job vacancies advertised in exactly the same way.
• You can get the same level of candidate access elsewhere – don’t be fooled into thinking that it is only the biggest agencies that have access to the greatest range of candidates. It’s not simply a case of volume, you need access to quality, talented candidates that are the right fit for your firm – and that means tailoring the hiring process to meet your specific needs.
• Smaller firms give the personal touch – smaller recruitment agencies can put in the time, effort and legwork to build relationships over time – both with you the client, and with those all-important candidates. The best specialist agencies will have built up relationships with firms over many years, building trust and reputation as they do.
• A credible voice in the legal market is invaluable – specialist agencies will be able to demonstrate detailed knowledge of the legal sector, and you’ll benefit from working with true experts in the field, rather than relying on a ‘one size fits all’ approach. Plus, you can tap into valuable industry help and advice, as and when you need it.
• Speed takes priority – this isn’t always the case but big recruitment agencies will often prioritise filling quotas, meeting targets and making commission, over providing you with the service you’re looking for. Time is money as they say…but what if speed over quality costs you more in the long run?
• They come at a high price – as well as charging high fees for their services, you might also find costs mount up elsewhere too. Failed hires, in particular, are extremely expensive for legal firms, highlighting the importance of investing wisely from the start to find the right candidate to fit your role.
• Sophisticated data analytics aren’t just for the giants – increasingly data analytics are playing a bigger part in recruitment but you don’t have to be using a big recruitment agency in order to access them. Specialist firms will often have a better insight into the data that specifically concerns the legal profession.
• Thinking outside the box pays off – if you want to successfully reach out and recruit a range of legal professionals, you need to be thinking outside of the box. Not only are millennials more likely to jump ship, research shows that 90% of professionals are interested in hearing about new job opportunities…so it’s important you don’t overlook passive candidates, in search of only active ones.

Finding the right fit for your firm is more important now than ever before and having the right recruiting process in place – with a focus on the personal touch as well as just ‘filling the role’ – is essential.
Of course, the most effective way to find, access and attract exceptional legal talent is by ensuring you’re working with a recruitment provider that understands your firm and helps you to get the most out of your candidate search. To find out more about what a specialist firm can bring to the table, just get in touch with us here at Clayton

The New Year is an ideal time for a fresh start and, as a result, more people decide to make a career move than at any other point. So, with companies likely to see a significant increase in the amount of applications from which they must shortlist, how can they ensure that they pick out the right candidates? Here are our top five tips.

1) Before you begin to look at the applications, it’s vital that you define your ideal candidate. Use your job description and person specification to create two checklists: the essential criteria and desirable criteria needed to do the job. The standards are likely to relate to all of the following key areas, plus any others that are relevant:  education, work experience, skills and knowledge, competencies and personality traits. Be very strict about the criteria you term ‘essential’: these should relate to the qualities and traits of top performing employees in the role.

2) The next step is to begin the shortlisting process. At this stage, some employers choose to utilise the services of a specialist recruiter that knows the market inside out: they can identify the right talent quickly and may already have people among their network of candidates that might fit the role.

3) If shortlisting in-house, do so in stages.

Stage 1: Go through the applications and discard any that don’t meet all of the essential criteria. You now have a list of candidates who can all do the fundamentals of the role. At this point, it is also worthwhile noting where applications have come from so that you know where to advertise future vacancies.

Stage 2: Decide how many candidates you want to interview. Go through the remaining applications, weigh them against each item in your list of desirable criteria and record the number of criteria they meet. Some recruiters like to use a spreadsheet as this helps them to rank candidates at a glance. During this stage, you should also check that there are no inconsistencies in their CV and that spelling, punctuation, grammar, presentation and attention to detail are in line with your expectations.

4) You can now decide who to select for interview. It is important to think outside the box here: you may have a list of desirable criteria, but it’s unlikely that an individual will meet all of them, so decide which combination will have the most impact. Also, if you are replacing a current post holder, don’t have a vision of replacing like with like: think about what they could do when they joined, rather than what they can do now.

5) In addition to notifying the candidates selected for the next stage, ensure that you also contact everyone who applied –even if there were hundreds- to thank them for their interest, but letting them know that, unfortunately, this time they have not been shortlisted for interview. A superior candidate experience is crucial in today’s skills short environment. After all, a candidate that isn’t the right fit for now might just be, in the future.

If you have a vacancy and would like to talk to us about how we can help you shortlist the right person for the job, contact our specialist team of recruiters.

We usually use this blog as a platform to offer advice, tips and updates on the legal landscape. However, we’re expanding rapidly and are on the lookout for individuals to join our team. Do you have what it takes to make it as a recruiter? Here are the top five skills you’ll need to succeed.

Confidence

You’ll need to be able to hold your own with people who are experts at what they do, and don’t appreciate their time being wasted and that means you have to be confident. Nobody wants to be consulted on a potentially life changing job move by someone who they suspect might know not their specialist field as well as they say they do. You need to be confident enough to take on new areas of expertise, but also be able to portray that confidence to clients and candidates. In addition, you’ll have to be comfortable picking up the phone and engaging with people who don’t know what your credentials are and likely to be at least mildly sceptical about what you’re doing. Many jobs require people to be confident, but not many where it’s as important as it is in recruitment.

Communication

Along similar lines, you’ll need to be an effective and concise communicator and able to get your point across quickly. You’ll probably be speaking to people who are busy in their current roles and don’t want to waste hours of their lives chatting to a recruiter. You’ll also need to be able to master your email communications and online marketing on platforms like LinkedIn. After all, you’re not going to have much success if your job advert iz ritten lyk dis.

Resilience

It’s not just applicants who face rejection, recruiters do too and you need to be able to take the bumps on the road and still be able to perform to the best of your ability. You’ll have good days and bad – that’s a given – but the secret is being able to prevent the bad days from affecting your output.

Target driven and motivated

At the vast majority of firms, you’ll have certain KPIs to work to. That’s an approach that’s not suited to everyone and not all organisations have the same model, people who are motivated by the idea of working to specific goals will do well here.

Multi-tasking and speed

As a job applicant it’s unlikely you’ll have used just one recruiter to help your job search and organisations are the same and will look to multiple sources for their own talent. This means that if you can move quickly and efficiently, then you’ll be able to beat your competitors. However, you’ll also have a lot to do at once and will likely be dealing with a lot of vacancies and therefore multiple companies and even more candidates. Consequently, you must be able to juggle multiple projects and various tasks simultaneously. You’ll have to keep in mind the details, experience and motivators of a large number of people and this requires a lot of organisational competency. If you can master the idea of ‘less haste, more speed’ then you’ll do well.

Do you have what it takes?

If you’re looking for a career in a challenging and fast-moving, but also highly rewarding, industry and want to join a successful, supportive and rapidly growing organisation, then get in touch with one of our expert consultants for a chat.  And for more insights from the team take a look at our other blogs.

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The number of employers implementing agile working policies has climbed sharply in recent years, and as city firms battle to attract and retain top legal talent, a range of practices are introducing policies which give lawyers greater flexibility over their work/life balance. In a profession that is known for its exceptionally long hours and substantial focus on productivity, the prospect of working flexibly will likely be welcomed by many.

Understandably many firms have broached the prospect of agile working somewhat tentatively with the notable exceptions of two city practices in Schillings and Mishcon de Reya, who have both introduced new and innovative flexible working practices. Schillings recently announced that lawyers only need to come into the office two days a week, while Kevin Gold, the managing partner of Mishcon de Reya, allows lawyers to work from home as many or few days as they want.

Ultra – agile – the way to retain top legal talent?

Mischon De Reya pioneered the ultra-agile working trend when its managing partner Kevin Gold told lawyers they could work as many or few days in the office as they want, in addition to being able to take unlimited holiday. Gold claimed that the policy stemmed from wanting to foster greater gender balance within the firm, and encourage female talent to return to the profession after taking a career break to have children. Interestingly Mischon De Reya was one of few firms to post 100% autumn retention scores.

Following the upheaval of its existing flexible working scheme, Schillings is set to eliminate all fixed desks from its offices in favour of a new ‘desk booking system’ that enables lawyers to book a spot for a specific day or week. Christopher Mills, Shillings’ COO said that the scheme aimed to improve collaboration between the firm’s various teams, including cyber security and intelligence. He also highlighted recruitment and retention as a key driver behind the implementation.

Flexible working – the way ahead?

According to a recent study by Grass Roots, 49% of employees claimed that flexible working arrangements and work-life balance are their most valuable benefits. Interestingly the same study found that while 84% of all respondents indicated that their benefit package was important in keeping them in their current role, that figure rose to 93% for 25-44 year olds. These figures support the growing consensus that younger generations are increasingly beginning to value holistic benefits packages over additional cash compensation.

While the take up of flexible working arrangements in law may not be a quick as in industries such as media and tech, it’s evident that more and more practices are coming to realise the value of such policies. And with millennials searching for ever more holistic benefits packages agile working polices may set one firm out above the next when professionals are searching for a new role.