CLARKE WILLMOTT

INTERNAL PROMOTIONS

Overall	2004-05	2005-06	2006-07
	3	3	2

2006-07: Property 2
2005-06: Employment 1, clinical negligence 1, litigation 1
2004-05: Private client 1, property 2

LATERALS

Overall	2004	2005	2006
	8	12	7

2006-07: Property 7
2005-06: Property 7, litigation 3, family 1, corporate 1
2004-05: Property 6, insolvency 1, private client 1

Intake as percentage of partnership: 14.5

New female partners as percentage of intake: 33.3

Equity structure: 33 equity partners, 31 non-equity

Practice area(s) most heavily promoted: Property

*Figures supplied relate to the calendar year

Bristol-based Clarke Willmott has had a tempestuous 2006-07, during which it has hired seven partners but lost five. The recruitment reflects the firm’s opportunistic decision to scale up in Birmingham via hires from Heatons’ now dissolved Birmingham office, while the losses are the result of a series of raids from Bristol and Birmingham rival Osborne Clarke.
But all this movement has been to the detriment of the firm’s home-grown talent, with Clarke Willmott making only eight partnership promotions in the past three years compared with 27 lateral partner hires. Most of this recruitment has been in property-related disciplines.