People: SAS Daniels; EY; The Fairhursts Design Group; JLL; DWF
Cheshire law firm SAS Daniels has appointed Stewart Burrows as partner in the dispute resolution team at its Chester city centre office.
Stewart joins having acquired 20 years’ experience working within law firms across the North West. He has acted for individuals, SMEs and larger corporations across a range of civil/commercial litigation issues including contractual disputes, property litigation, contested probate, construction claims, professional negligence, partnership and shareholder disputes, disputed insolvency and intellectual property litigation.
The Legal 500 identified Stewart as “an experienced commercial litigator with noted capabilities in high value, complex contract law and shareholder issues”. He was also noted as being “commercially astute, has a pragmatic approach to litigation and a talent for identifying cases at an early stage that have good merits in succeeding”.
Stewart said: “It’s an exciting time to be joining SAS Daniels, who have a strong dispute resolution department and the firm demonstrating that it can ably compete with firms in Manchester and Liverpool. My goal for clients is to obtain a practical, commercial, and cost effective resolution to their business and personal disputes, and I’m looking forward to using my experience and knowledge to work with the firm’s existing and new clients to achieve that goal successfully.”
Stewart joins an established team in Chester with Ray Woodward and Kathryn Clare, and together, they are able to draw on their extensive experience to help their clients navigate complex legal challenges and find solutions for their businesses or personal disputes.
Kaye Whitby, corporate partner and head of the Chester office, said: “Our Chester city centre team continues to go from strength to strength and this appointment is testament to the growth of our team by the appointment of technically astute lawyers who are committed to providing commercial thinking, thereby delivering a solution-driven, dedicated and pragmatic approach to the needs of our clients both existing and new.
“I am delighted to welcome Stewart, who is already proving to be a great asset to the firm.”
SAS Daniels is a full service law firm with offices in Chester, Congleton, Macclesfield and Stockport.
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EY has welcomed a total of 70 graduates and apprentices to the firm this year, reinforcing its commitment to invest in and nurture early talent.
This represents an increase of nine per cent on last year’s intake, as the firm continues to build out its talent pipeline across the North West. EY’s Manchester office welcomed 63 graduates and apprentices, while seven graduates and apprentices joined its Liverpool office.
Of the new joiners, 41% are women, and 23% are from ethnic minorities.
A further 32 students were given temporary short term placements through industrial placements and summer internships to gain vital work experience. In addition, the EY Foundation – EY’s independent charity – provided short term placements to 118 people from across the North West on its Smart Futures, Tech Futures and Beyond Your Limits programmes in 2021. Through these programmes, the EY Foundation helps support young people from low income backgrounds to receive paid work experience, mentoring, employability skills training and career advice.
The new hires are part of EY’s 1,088 student recruits across the UK, which includes 909 graduates and 179 apprentices. Forty four percent of all the student recruits this year will be based outside of London, with notably large intakes in Birmingham, Bristol, Leeds, Manchester, Newcastle and Reading.
Stephen Church
EY has strong growth plans for the North West, and recently announced the launch of a Neuro-Diverse Centre of Excellence in the UK, which has set an ambition to hire 150 neurodivergent individuals over the next three years, who will work within EY’s integrated client teams. The programme is open to both graduates and experienced hires, and is currently recruiting for its first intake of five individuals in Manchester.
Stephen Church, office managing partner for EY in Manchester, said: “I am delighted to welcome so many new graduates and apprentices to the firm, as they begin their career with EY. It is brilliant to see that we have increased our intake from last year, demonstrating our commitment to student recruitment and the growth of the firm.
“At a time when many young people across the North West continue to face a challenging labour market, we have continued to recruit throughout the pandemic, and honoured all conditional offers we made prior to A-Level results for the second year running.”
He added: “Young talent is essential to our future business success and to shaping the skills we will need to remain competitive. We know that many of these new hires will become the future leaders of our business, so it’s vital that we equip them with the expertise, skills and hands-on experience needed to get their EY career off to a flying start. I wish them all every success.”
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Manchester architects, The Fairhursts Design Group (FDG), is welcoming a new managing director and adding to its senior management team as part of a strategic plan for the future.
The practice, which this year celebrated its 125th year in business, has appointed Mark Adey as managing director after 25 years with the company. In recent years, Adey has spearheaded the firm’s highly complex and innovative work within the science and education sectors, and is currently leading the team delivering ‘Project Atria’, the new Heart and Lung Research Institute at the University of Cambridge.
Adey’s promotion comes as Richard Sagar moves into a business development and mentoring role on a consultancy basis.
In addition, the FDG board has also promoted Laura Sherliker to director and Stevie Leigh to associate director to further strengthen its leadership team. Sherliker joined FDG in 2020 to tackle business development and design schemes within science and education, while Leigh has been with the company for four years and heads up FDG’s growing interior design team working on projects across all business sectors.
Mark Adey said: “Richard joined FDG as an 18-year-old trainee in 1972 and became managing director in 2015. Not only has his contribution to the built environment been enormous, he has also had an extremely positive influence on our staff who have grown personally and professionally under his leadership, myself included.
From left: Laura Sherliker, Mark Adey, Stevie Leigh
“Richard has done a fantastic job in steering the business, and we are fortunate to be retaining him in a part-time role so we can continue to benefit from his knowledge and experience.”
He added: “Richard is a hard act to follow, but I am excited to be taking on my new position and to be joined by such a talented leadership team which now includes Laura and Stevie, two incredibly talented and driven individuals.
“Day to day my focus will remain with our clients and ensuring we deliver high quality, innovative design solutions across all our business sectors. Our industry faces many challenges going forward, but we are committed to the future of the business and providing opportunities for the next generation of the FDG family.”
FDG, which has offices in Manchester, Southampton and Cambridge, offers expert design consultancy to the education, science, advanced manufacturing and office sectors as well as industrial, sports and media organisations in the UK and abroad.
Recent projects include the delivery of the School of Digital Arts (SODA) at Manchester Metropolitan University, the Jeffrey Cheah Biomedical Centre in Cambridge, Blocks 19, 22, 23 and 24 at Bruntwood’s Alderley Park in Cheshire, a new master rebuild facility in Casablanca, Morocco for Cummins Inc, and an exciting masterplan for the proposed Advanced Machinery and Productivity Institute at Kingsway Business Park in Rochdale.
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Professional services firm JLL has announced that Tom McWilliams has returned to the business as head of development for the North of England.
Tom has joined from Property Alliance Group, where he was development director from 2018. At PAG, he oversaw saw a number of strategic development projects, including the structuring of a £200m joint venture partnership with Starwood Capital and the acquisition of the landmark Renaissance site in Manchester city centre.
Tom McWilliams
Before working at PAG, Tom spent more than a decade at JLL from 2007 to 2018 as a developer director. As head of development for the North of England, Tom will draw on his recent private sector client-side experience and bring together the development teams in the Manchester and Leeds offices to provide clients with a seamless service across the North of England. This will be supported by JLL’s planning, occupational agency, living, capital markets and PDS teams.
Tom said, “I am delighted to be returning to JLL at such an exciting time for the business. I’m confident that through combining the high skillsets and experiences of teams across the North, we will be able to deliver an even better service to our customers, also enabling us to take advantage of the Government’s focus on regeneration.”
Paul Baker, head of planning & development UK regions, said: “Tom brings along a tremendous level of experience to JLL, particularly most recently in the private sector and we are very pleased to welcome him back. It is without a doubt that this will bolster his success in joining up the development consultancy service across the North.”
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DWF, the Manchester-based global provider of integrated legal and business services, has appointed Dora Grant as UK deputy head of its regulatory consulting team.
Dora is an experienced risk management, governance and compliance professional with experience gained from within the financial services industry from FTSE 100 companies, challenger banks, start-ups and professional services firms. She joins DWF from BDO where she was a senior manager.
Dora Grant
At DWF, Dora will provide regulatory advice to help clients meet their regulatory and compliance needs. She will also support Andrew Jacobs, head of regulatory consulting, in further developing the practice that provides a full range of regulatory services across a number of sub-sectors – from complex projects and regulatory change management to ad-hoc support and ongoing services.
Andrew Jacobs said: “Dora is a welcome addition to the growing regulatory consulting team.
“Her experience and reputation in the market aligns with our business’s deep pedigree in supporting clients though a wide range of regulatory and compliance matters. I look forward to working closely with Dora.”
Dora said: “I am excited to join DWF and working with the teams to support clients on their compliance and regulatory needs.
“DWF’s clear global presence is definitely a key attraction to joining the business, as are the growth and success of the regulatory consulting team since established just two years ago. My experience and drive, together with DWF’s reputation in the market, will allow me to help grow the practice. I look forward to getting started and working with the team.”
