UK talent ripe for picking

LOCAL RECRUITERS say they are responding to requests from Australian law firms looking to bring locally-trained talent back to Australia, once lured away by the profitable UK job market

LOCAL RECRUITERS say they are responding to requests from Australian law firms looking to bring locally-trained talent back to Australia, once lured away by the profitable UK job market.

The renewed interest in international recruitment campaigns comes at a time when job security in London is uncertain. A global economic crisis is still catching up on Australia, and in the meantime a local talent shortage makes the appeal of British-trained talent welcome.

Edward Andrews, managing director at EA International believes that for many years overseas firms have taken the cream of the Australian market, and that Australian firms now want their people back. “The recruitment market in London is pretty much drying up, especially for transactional lawyers, particularly because of the state of the financial crisis in capital markets in Europe and America,” he said.

Laura Evans, a consultant on the private practice team at Taylor Root said they have already run four campaigns for top Australian law firms over the past 12 months. “We placed a number of UKlawyers mainly within the fields of corporate, financial and litigation. Those were the areas most in demand,” she said.

While Taylor Root has not run any UK campaigns this year, they have had requests from firms to do so. “We believe we will be running two or three over the course of the year and we’re in discussion on those at the moment,” she said.

It’s the mid-level lawyers with around three to six years’ experience who are in the most demand, especially UK-qualified Australians returning home. “We recruit from the magic circle, from city firms and more recently the regional firms,” Evans said.

Jonathan Walmsley, director at Dolman, said the last major campaign Dolman ran in the UK was for Baker & McKenzie about a year ago. While it has been quiet since, Walmsley said that they have been approached by both a national firm and a mid-tier firm now interested in running campaigns overseas.

Meanwhile, Andrews said that EA International has also been approached by firms locally interested in running London-based campaigns, but they’ve been careful to decline all to date.

“We have never yet run a campaign in London and the stance we take on that is we believe it is disingenuous to be working for the global law firms and their officers around the world – and then try and poach their lawyers away,” he said.

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