Job Market Update – April 9th
The job market in March has been a game of two halves. In the run up to Easter it was rather quiet, with little going on. The Easter break seemed to have an effect on concentrating the mind a little bit and as we have returned things have got very busy. For the first time as far as I can remember we have a large number of vacancies being posted in April, which is usually one of the quietest months of the year. Conveyancing appears to be busy, wills & probate the same and we have had in house posts coming through as well.
Crime solicitors are not exactly in great demand this year and the announcement this morning that competitive tendering is coming into force this autumn will no doubt send shivers down the spine of many a defence lawyer. I must note that competitive tendering seems to have been coming into force every year since 2005 so whether it actually manages to proceed this time is another matter. It will be interesting to see if the LSC end up awarding contracts to lots of smaller new start up firms or huge operations both going for the cheapest price option. Either way it is pretty obvious anyone running a decent crime firm paying reasonable money to their solicitors is not going to be in a favourable position…
We have recently signed up for a trial with a company who scrape vacancies off law firm websites and send them through to recruiters so that we can see who is looking and for what. This has been quite interesting because it gives a cross section of the market at the moment (assuming the scraping is accurate of course!).
In the last week there have been:
7 Conveyancing Jobs
8 Corporate Commercial Jobs
7 Clinical Negligence Jobs
7 Wills & Probate Jobs
6 Construction Jobs
13 Personal Injury Jobs
4 Crime Jobs
3 Family Jobs
6 Financial Services and Tax Jobs
3 Civil and Commercial Litigation Jobs
Our own numbers have been highest in conveyancing and wills & probate. Most of the personal injury jobs appear to be with law firms with links to to the insurance industry as they presumably tighten their grip on the PI market. Interestingly firms seem to be trying to expand into clinical negligence, perhaps as a way to continue with personal injury work, but concentrating on an area seen to be more profitable with the new limits on RTA matters.
The construction increase comes as a bit of a surprise as reports have recently been bandied about indicating that the construction market is again declining after a short spurt of activity.
Locums
Getting busy as we approach the locum season. We have seen assignments both an ongoing basis as firms recruit for 1-3 days per week (locums give you the flexibility to expand and contract as work ebbs and flows) and those more urgently needed to cover annual or sick leave. Now is the time to start getting bookings in for 2013, particularly summer holiday cover. A number of our locums have their years fully booked already, but we have plenty of capacity. www.interimlawyers.co.uk is our specialist site for locum and contract assignments.
Questions
Any questions regarding the above? Contact me via LinkedIn (www.linkedin.com/in/jbfagan), Facebook, Twitter (@tenpercentlegal) or old fashioned email – jbfagan@ten-percent.co.uk
Jonathan Fagan, April 9th 2013.
