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Gowling To Require UK Staff To Spend 60% Of Time In Office

Gowling WLG said on Tuesday that it will require legal staff in the U.K. to spend at least 60% of their time working in the office, after a recent survey revealed that half of law firms are "actively looking" at increasing in-office attendance.

Andy Stylianou, chair of Gowling's business in the U.K., said in a statement that the law firm will require its legal teams to spend at least 60% of their time in the office from May — equivalent to three days a week. The firm currently expects its employees to spend at least half of their time in the office.

Stylianou said that Gowling has offered "agile" working for several years, including before the COVID-19 pandemic. He added that the firm keeps its approach to hybrid working under review "to ensure we are delivering the very best for our clients and fostering a strong team culture, alongside flexibility for our people.

First appeared in www.law360.com

"We know from our experience over the last year or so that more regular time in the office supports collaboration, helps our people build their skills and experience by working side-by-side with colleagues and ensures that our culture continues to thrive," Stylianou continued.

An annual report into business trends published in January by an IT business, Advanced Computer Software Group, revealed that half of the legal employers that took part in a survey of more than 6,600 business executives are "actively looking" at increasing in-office attendance.

A quarter, 27%, reported that hybrid working is "one of their biggest day-to-day challenges." This is more than double the proportion of legal businesses reporting this problem a year earlier, according to Advanced.

Doug Hargrove, senior vice president of legal and professional services at Advanced, said at the time that law firms had experienced an average increase of almost 30% in complaints since 2022. A quarter said that trying to make improvements for clients is a top challenge.

One third of legal professionals who were surveyed said that it was their top business challenge to attract and retain staff. Some 43% said that it was a priority for the next 12 months to tackle this.

More than a third, 37%, of legal professionals who responded to a similar survey a year earlier in 2022 told Advanced that their firms were offering flexible working options as part of their strategy to attract and retain employees.

Meanwhile, Law360's latest U.K. Lawyer Satisfaction Survey, published earlier in March, found that almost two thirds of participants, 63%, were being asked to be in the office for three days or more. That is an increase of seven percentage points on the 56% recorded in 2023.

Only 10% of lawyers are being allowed to remain fully remote, down from 16% from the year before, the Law360 survey shows. But most lawyers, 72%, said they are satisfied with the in-office policy at their firm.

Another law firm, Clifford Chance LLP, has a policy that requires staff in the U.K. to spend at least five days in the office over a two-week period. The Magic Circle law firm said in January that it has decided to keep its hybrid working policy as it is. It also said that it would begin collecting data on how many days employees are coming to the offices in London and Newcastle.

Read more at: https://www.law360.com/articles/1817510/gowling-to-require-uk-staff-to-spend-60-of-time-in-office?copied=1

 
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