Shoosmiths moves into landmark XYZ
The Manchester office of national law firm Shoosmiths has moved into brand new state-of-the-art premises at the XYZ building in Spinningfields, transferring its entire 190 strong team into an agile working environment.
A strategic investment for the firm, Shoosmiths’ new Manchester headquarters at Allied London’s XYZ will support recruitment and ensure the office can continue to pursue its growth ambitions.
The custom-designed agile workspace will also enable Shoosmiths to apply a new approach to professional services delivery in the North West.
The new office concept was arrived at following close consultation with employees and agile workspace fit-out specialists, Claremont. Shoosmiths has already introduced agile working at its offices in Reading and London.
The law firm’s new Manchester office occupies 32,000sq ft of space at XYZ and has been designed to enable the firm to adopt a fully agile work culture. It incorporates 11 different types of workspace along with break-out areas.
It includes workspaces include a garden, a library that blends elements of modern and traditional interior design, a multi-zonal project room, drafting areas, touch down zones, singular and group booths and telecon rooms. Each of the office’s five practice groups will be assigned their own ‘neighbourhood’, which incorporate traditional deskspace, along with collaborative areas.
To facilitate free movement around the various workspaces, Shoosmiths has invested in a purpose-designed IT solution that will mean employees can roam the building whilst staying fully connected.
Teams will use wifi-only laptops and cloud phones, along with wireless casting that will enable them to project from laptops onto large screens throughout the office.
Head of Shoosmiths Manchester, Vaqas Farooq said: “We are hugely excited to be in our new home. The move signals a new era for the Manchester office; the culmination of years of consultation and development work.
“Shoosmiths prides itself on doing things differently and on the quality of its client and employee experience. By investing in modern, bespoke, agile offices we will ensure that we continue to blaze a trail on each of these fronts.
“We are changing the way that legal advisers work in the North West and are utilising the latest technology to support this new approach. Our new offices have been designed to make us ultra-responsive and collaborative, so that teams can work together efficiently and innovate.
“When it comes to recruitment and employee retention we know that millennials like to work collaboratively and that junior lawyers benefit hugely from an open environment and exposure to a variety of disciplines and colleagues.”
He added: “Agile working has benefits for employees across the board though, in terms of wellbeing as people aren’t sat at desks all day long and have greater levels of interaction with others.
“We want to give our team the autonomy to decide for themselves how and where they want to work and believe the office space will offer something to suit all preferences.”
The office was officially opened by lawyers Hannah Gaskell and Alice Casey who won a colleague competition to name the client meeting rooms in the new office.
