Associate Editor Caroline Hill reports… As an increasing number of top 50 law firms set up contract lawyer businesses for their clients, leading legal recruitment agency Taylor Root is to overhaul and rebrand its own interim recruitment business, including offering professional indemnity insurance for candidates. Taylor Root’s 12-strong interim recruitment team will, as of the second quarter of 2015, operate under the distinct banner of Fluid Resourcing, and is in developed negotiations with two general counsel (GCs) to come on board as consultants to help run the business.
Key changes will include providing clients with references on how a candidate has performed during a previous assignment and a more rigorous overall assessment of candidates, including, in some cases, requiring them to undertake online testing. The agency has come to an agreement with an insurance company to cover its interim lawyers with professional indemnity (PI) insurance. PI is said by some GCs, particularly within the financial services sector, to be a key factor in managing their risk profile.
Taylor Root is responding to the huge demand for flexible legal support within in-house teams that has also seen law firms such as Allen & Overy, Eversheds and Pinsent Masons all set up contract lawyer arms, under which lawyers are covered by the firm’s PI but are often more expensive than traditional interim candidates.
Taylor Root partner Julian Stone said “We’re revisiting what we’re offering, making it more effective and more closely aligned with law firm offerings while retaining our lower costs. Law firms have a good client base but lack candidates. We have both.”