Walker Morris recruits seven extra newly qualifieds as business booms

Leeds-based Walker Morris has hired extra newly qualified solicitors despite offering jobs to all its September qualifiers.

The firm retained all of the 15 trainees who qualified last month, but has had to recruit an additional seven lawyers as a result of growth in business across all departments.

To meet the demand, the firm has increased the intake of trainees to 20 per year, making it one of the biggest trainee recruiters in Leeds.

Walker Morris joins only handful of firms that can boast trainee retention rates of 100 per cent. According to research conducted by Lawyer 2B only Cleary Gottlieb Steen & Hamilton, Ince & Co, Jones Day, Nabarro and Shearman & Sterling held on to all their newly qualified solicitors (Lawyer 2B, October 2007).

Nabarro showed one of the most dramatic improvements in trainee retention rates, jumping from 47 per cent in 2006 to 100 per cent in 2007.

The average retention rate for 2007 was up from 81.2 per cent last year to 82.5 per cent.