Law firm to shut Leeds office
Law firm BLM is to close its Leeds office as part of a wider cost-cutting exercise that will lead to redundancies among support staff.
The insurance risk and commercial law firm is also closing its Bristol office, with leases in the two cities expiring in March 2021 and November 2020 respectively.
In a statement, the firm said the Covid-19 restrictions had “given us an opportunity to accelerate our journey towards more agile ways of working in two of our locations”.
Its remaining 11 offices will be given more time to adapt to BLM’s “significant advances towards becoming a digital first business”.
Last November BLM revealed plans to bring its 645-strong Manchester teams together into a new building near Spinningfields. At the time senior partner Matthew Harrington said it was an important move “for the future of our business as we continue to develop our presence in the North, which is further enhanced by having offices in Leeds and Liverpool”.
A redundancy consultation has begun with “a number of roles” within its legal support and corporate services teams. Law.com has reported that 89 jobs are at risk.
BLM has seen turnover stay flat over the last five years, ranging between £104m-£108m and peaking in 2016. It has also been reducing the number of equity partners, from 77 in 2016 to 62 in 2019.
BLM’s senior partner Matthew Harrington said: “Whilst we are ceasing to have a physical office in Bristol and Leeds, our colleagues will be very much a part of the future of BLM supporting the firm’s clients as they do now.
“This is an opportunity to launch a new way of working, retaining local links but operating in a virtual way.”
The lockdown and subsequent continuation of working from home for those in professional services, which for many firms will continue until at least January, has transformed how they operate.
Harrington added: “While we have plans in place to deal with lots of different crisis scenarios, we could never have fully known the impact this pandemic would have our business and the need to rapidly accelerate our digital strategy, transforming the way we are working.
“Usually, such transformational change would evolve over many months and even years and in turn we would manage and adapt our workforce over time.”
