Autumn update/new arrivals and new opportunities

At Ian Walker Family Law and Mediation Solicitors we are constantly trying to improve the service that we give to our clients. So far 2019 has been a busy year.

New arrivals

This year Fiona Griffin joined our legal team in January. Fiona is a divorce expert (including high net worth clients) and a collaborative family lawyer. Fiona joined us from being a partner and head of family law at John Hodge solicitors in Weston-Super-Mare and Bristol.

Beyond Fiona, we have concentrated on reshaping our support team. In particular, we have decided to commit to the training of a new generation of family lawyers. Our first trainee solicitor is Tommy Fox. Tommy grew up in Honiton and attended Honiton Community College.

In September Tommy has been joined by Lydia Murray. Lydia joined us from Magdalen Chambers (barristers Chambers) in Exeter where she had been working as a junior family clerk after graduating from Exeter University. Like Tommy, Lydia is a Devon local having grown up in Crediton and attending Queen Elizabeth College, Crediton.

A further trainee solicitor is scheduled to start with us in December. More news to follow.

In addition, we already have Briony Phillips making good progress towards qualification as a legal executive. Briony is now working closely with our leading child law specialist Kim Stradling

Our Training Plan

Our plan is now to commence at least one solicitor training contract a year.

We are interested to hear from candidates for autumn 2020 with a good degree, and who will ideally have completed their LPC. Although we are open to running a training contract parallel to part-time LPC study.

We are particularly keen to promote the opportunity to enter the legal profession and to recruit talented candidates who want to enjoy a career with us. We do not wish to recruit graduate into dead end paralegal roles.

A passion for family law is essential.

Opportunities to join our team

We have finished work on a business plan to take us forward through the next five years. To this end there will be opportunities to join our team as our practice continues to grow.

We are happy to receive CVs from solicitors and legal executives who are newly qualified onward, and who might be interested in roles undertaking children law or divorce and Finance law. 

Roles could be as employed solicitors or legal executives or as fee share consultants. Either way its worth a chat….

We are happy to receive CVs from candidates who are already based in the south-west or who want to move down to our lovely part of the world.

Separate blog postings to follow…

The Law Society Excellence Awards

Following a successful first six years of trading, which culminated in our gaining the Lexcel practice management accreditation at the end of 2018, we were delighted to learn that Ian Walker has been shortlisted for practice manager of the year in the Prestigious Law Society Excellence Awards.

The award ceremony is at the Grosvenor House Hotel, Park Lane, London on the 23 October 2019. A few of us will be travelling up to London for the occasion. We will let you know how we get on…

Improving our client experience

Since achieving the law society Lexcel practice management standard we have taken further steps to improve the experience of our clients. Some of this is explained on our website, but other things are behind-the-scenes.

In particular we have adopted additional software solutions which we believe will improve how we assist our clients. We have also introduced a client service guarantee because we want our clients to know that we mean it when we say that we want to provide an outstanding service to them.

As a niche legal practice we are conscious that how clients wish to access information and advice has changed over the last 10 years and we anticipate that clients needs will continue to change.

It is therefore important that we are a progressive practice and the we are always open to new ideas to help us improve what we do.

That’s why we have taken the step to start to train our future lawyers and that is why we are open to hear from specialist family lawyers with differing PQE he wants to be part of our journey, and make a real and positive difference to the lives of our clients and their families….

CVs to [email protected]