Hamish McNicol looks at the frontrunners amid a bumper season of senior leadership changes
DLA Piper is making up for lost time in its first senior partner election in a decade. The month-long process, which initially involved eight candidates, two voting stages and ten days of hustings, has been heralded by the firm as showing its breadth and depth, but has also raised eyebrows.
‘It’s unbelievable really, isn’t it?’ queries one former DLA partner. ‘Why are eight people scrambling over each other to be senior partner?’
The election was triggered by Juan Picón’s surprise departure for Latham & Watkins less than two years into his term.
Of the pool vying to replace Picón, five were from London and one a female candidate. The firm is using a single transferable vote system split into two stages because of the high numbers, initially whittling the candidates down to the most popular three before ten days of hustings and a second vote. The new senior partner is announced on 12 February.
As Legal Business went to press the first voting round at the end of January confirmed the three contenders: London-based international corporate head Bob Bishop, emerging markets managing director Andrew Darwin and corporate partner Jon Hayes.
The second round puts three of the four touted front-runners up for the role, with Darwin having years of leadership experience and Bishop and Hayes established in recent years as two of the firm’s most significant practitioners.
The original field included Brussels competition partner Bertold Bär-Bouyssière, Paris employment partner Bijan Eghbal, Madrid corporate partner Iñigo Gomez-Jordana, finance partner Charles Morrison and life sciences co-chair Bonella Ramsay.
Interim senior partner Janet Legrand said: ‘This is the firm’s first contested election for senior partner in a decade and we are very fortunate to have such a high level of interest with eight experienced partners.’
Current DLA partners Legal Business spoke to echo these sentiments, while former partners and rivals questioned the need for so many candidates. Some also wondered – wrongly as it turned out – whether the London bias could split the vote.
‘None of the three European partners are anything like the slam dunk Juan Picón was.’
The veteran Darwin was viewed as the most likely to make the second stage. He has the highest profile of those running, being a member of the firm’s global board, and was formerly the firm’s chief operating officer, head of corporate and managing partner in the UK and Australia. Says one partner: ‘He’s very well respected and very well liked.’
The partner elaborated by saying Darwin’s work in reshaping DLA’s practice in Australia, seen by some as a ‘painful task’, had seen him gain the respect of the firm’s partners there, which could attract a block vote from Asia. In the UK, Darwin had managed to establish a reputation separate from his time as former leader Sir Nigel Knowles’ operational point man.
Lending weight to Darwin’s case is a former DLA partner, who says Darwin’s experience and knowledge of the firm could also provide a counter to the relative period of instability caused by Picón’s short tenure and resignation, which provoked a bitter reaction internally.
Hayes was likewise tipped from the start, with the former Linklaters corporate partner described as ‘sensible and a class act’ and another who is ‘very well liked’, while also being, alongside Darwin, the right kind of age for the role.
Ramsay, as the only female candidate in the initial running, had been seen as a credible contender to make the second round. She heads the firm’s intellectual property team in London and has worked with co-chief executive Simon Levine for a long time, with the pair both leaving Dentons for DLA in 2005 as part of an eye-catching 11-partner team switch. Board member Bishop was another candidate expected to gain significant support.
‘I will be very surprised if it isn’t those three [Darwin, Hayes and Ramsay],’ said one partner ahead of the first-round vote. ‘None of the three European partners are anything like the slam dunk Juan was.’
Picón (pictured), who first joined DLA in 2006 from Squire, Sanders & Dempsey, was one of DLA’s biggest billers and during his time he strengthened the firm’s relationship with Vodafone after being instructed on its €7.2bn acquisition of Spanish broadband company Ono.
DLA’s senior partner race is the standout contest amid a spate of leadership changes announced at the start of the year. Incumbent James Palmer is set to run again in Herbert Smith Freehills’ senior partner elections, with arbitration head Paula Hodges QC cited as credible opposition. The senior partner is expected to be confirmed by the end of February.
Macfarlanes opted to take heavy-handed politics out of the equation, announcing in January that long-serving senior partner Charles Martin will be succeeded in April 2020, when his latest term ends, by private client partner Sebastian Prichard Jones. Another long-serving and popular law firm leader, Brodies’ Bill Drummond, also announced that he would not be running again after 20 years as managing partner, handing over to real estate head Nick Scott in April.
Elsewhere, Travers Smith has re-elected David Patient, who stood unopposed, for a second three-year term starting on 1 July as managing partner. Hogan Lovells also announced in January that Hamburg-based Leopold von Gerlach will replace Nicholas Cheffings as chair of the board on 1 May for a three-year term.
Meanwhile, white-collar crime heavyweight Stephen Parkinson was last month named Kingsley Napley’s new senior partner, effective 1 May, replacing Jane Keir unopposed. Legal Business 100 firms Burges Salmon and Fladgate also announced senior leadership changes, with Roger Bull replacing Peter Morris as managing partner at Burges Salmon in May and Richard Reuben to replace Charles Wander as Fladgate’s new chair in April.