Internal promotions

Laterals

Intake as percentage of partnership 2005-06: 10

New female partners as percentage of intake 2005-06: 42

Firms recruited from: Clifford Chance, Lawrence Graham

Equity structure: 121 equity partners, 126 non-equity partners

Practice area(s) most heavily promoted: Corporate, real estate

Pinsent Masons' figures are tricky to read, because Pinsents and Masons have only recently merged. However, both firms tended to recruit partners internally rather than laterally. Legacy Pinsents took on eight laterals in 2004-05 but counterbalanced that with 16 promotions in the same year. Masons made no laterals that year and had six promotions. Projects, construction and IT dominated at Masons, while banking, corporate and property were Pinsents' favoured sectors for promotions.
The 2005-06 round of partnership promotions show that the legacy Pinsents associates probably had a better shot at partnership, if the office statistics are anything to go by. In the previous two years, Masons had appointed a total of 18 new partners, of whom two were lateral hires. Seven were in London, four in Scotland, four in Manchester, one in Bristol, one in Hong Kong and one in Shanghai.
Pinsents' total of 31 new partners over that period were concentrated in London (11), Birmingham (11) Leeds (six) and Manchester (three). In 2005-06 the merged firm made up nine in London, four in Birmingham, one in Manchester, three in Leeds and one in Hong Kong. Legacy Masons offices in Bristol, Edinburgh and Glasgow got no partners throughout this time.
The sectors, however, are spread across the board, with corporate and property just edging it.