City law firms are hiring more permanent staff as confidence grows in the banking and transactional sectors.
Recruitment consultancy Badenoch and Clark reports an increase in permanent hires in City firms in the first quarter of 2011, and an appetite for growth in the banking sector.
The head of City recruitment for Badenoch and Clark, Ian Holloway, says investment banks are hiring more staff generally and this is having a knock-on effect on legal departments, with banks hiring teams of three to four, or in some cases up to a dozen, in-house lawyers. The most sought after areas are debt capital markets, litigation regulation and compliance.
Holloway says there is a “noted increase” in permanent hires among City law firms, particularly in transactional areas such as leverage finance.
Badenoch’s recruiters also note an upward trend in in-house salaries, with counter offering becoming “commonplace” in the in-house legal market.
