Articles From the Team

Looking back: working as an in-house lawyer in 2018

I joined BCL Legal in February this year, having worked in the in-house market for over 7 years.  It was a big decision but one of the most important factors for me, was being part of the in-house market and working with a team of dedicated in-house specialists.

This year, I've been very lucky to work with some fantastic companies across the North West.  It hasn’t been easy to find the right lawyer at times - commercial lawyers are at a real premium - but the most successful processes belonged to businesses that could be flexible, either in terms of PQE or area of law, and who invested time into talking about their requirements in depth.

I was shown around the employee spa at AO.com, visited the bet365 head office in time to ask their GC his thoughts on Daniel Sturridge’s betting activity and watched Whitley & Neill gin being produced at Halewood.  I have been to city centres and business parks across Greater Manchester, Chester, Merseyside, Lancashire and Cumbria.

I worked with boohoo.com, JD Sports, Manchester Airport Group, Matalan, Odeon, On The Beach and BookingGo.  As well as a host of great businesses you may not have heard of!

GDPR was the acronym on everyone’s lips and the Brexit saga continues to cast its shadow.

It was certainly busy; we helped to find new roles for over 50 lawyers in the North West alone.  We also continued our programme of seminars with some of the top law firms in Manchester and Liverpool and found time to fit in a summer party.

The enduring message was that great in-house lawyers, and commercial lawyers moving from private practice were in short supply. Moving into 2019, with ongoing speculation about the impact of our decision to leave Europe, could we start to see a shift?