We have many enquiries from Solicitors asking about the prospect of working In-house. In theory, we understand that In-house opportunities are attractive on the basis that you don’t have the pressure of billable hours or working long hours networking to encourage new clients to your firm and you only have one client to service and that is your employer.
However, what we do know is that In-house opportunities are virtually non-existent in the Southwest. This is simply down to the size of companies in the region, not requiring an in-house team and happy to outsource to a firm of solicitors.
We recently asked a Senior Associate who approached us about whether we recruit many in-house roles what is was about an in-house role that appealed to them at this stage I their career and the answer they gave was as follows; “as a senior associate in my current firm I can no clear path to Partnership, there are several Partners in place who are a long way off retirement and two other Senior Associates in the team who have been in situ longer than I have. I do not feel progression is a reality for me in my current firm and the likelihood of finding a Partnership opportunity with a competitor is highly unlikely”.
We were bemused with this response as we always have several Partnership roles available, we can’t always advertise these positions due to confidentiality but that doesn’t mean they don’t exist. We also work in what we describe as a ‘candidate-led market’, this loosely translates into, if a law firm doesn’t know you are looking then they don’t know they want to recruit you! There are several ways around finding out what Partnership opportunities are available, and we can give advice and guidance in relation to how this can be achieved without anyone finding out who you are.