It never occurred to me to be a lawyer until sixth form. I went to a regular comprehensive school and there wasn’t much career advice. I was a teenager who just wanted to be a footballer or rockstar.
My parents hadn’t been to university. I’m from Nottinghamshire, born in Mansfield. My grandad was a miner and the one thing he wanted was for his son not to be a miner, so my dad imaginatively went to the coal board as an accounts clerk.
The day I arrived at Oxford I didn’t know what the law meant. I thought it meant you could only drive at 30 miles-per-hour in a built-up area. But I realised the bright lights of London were beckoning and it was the place to make your way.
I didn’t come out of school knowing about culture, literature or fine wines. Oxford was staggering! I don’t think I ever got over it. The whole place was weird and elitist. I remember in my first week seeing girls cycling along singing opera at the top of their voices. I remember thinking: ‘This is so weird!’
Rather than integrate, I grew a chip on my shoulder. It’s still there. I continued through my early career to now wanting to do things my way.
The City’s got worse. If you look at the proportion of students from private schools who go into law firms and other professional services practices, it’s as high now as it was then.
There’s more awareness now – there’s a basis for a change. But across the City, this acknowledgment has only led to grabbing the low-hanging fruit. It’s not a triumph for diversity to label the white, middle-aged Etonian as a symbol of privilege and then to promote his sister who went to Cheltenham Ladies’ College and Oxford to a role. That’s superficial. We need to start looking at social mobility.
I’ve had a lot of good fortune and you need that in life. Getting into Oxford was a massive break. Getting into Slaughters was lucky. I was a very raw candidate with a lot of rough edges and Slaughters saw through that.
Oxford was staggering! The whole place was weird and elitist. Rather than integrate, I grew a chip on my shoulder.
In the run up to becoming a partner in 1996, I hedged my bets in case I didn’t make it, so I looked at investment banking and got an offer. I would have had to choose from an investment bank or another law firm but probably would have gone for banking.
At the heart of it you have to be a good lawyer. On the deals we get, quite often there are difficult points. I can think of a number of matters over the years where, without us, the deal simply would have fallen through and that’s because of the extremely good lawyering.
An important aspect is whether you put clients first and want them to succeed. Everyone says they do, but we here actually do. As lawyers you train to be independent, objective and thoughtful. But within that, you have to empathise with a client and give everything you’ve got to get that for them. You’ve got to be in the trenches and advise, guide and lead.
We are part of tiny number in the world of professional service providers that do that; it’s tiny and they’re all lawyers. You don’t see it from the accountants and you don’t see it from management consultants, you don’t see it from bankers… you only see it from a few lawyers. If you go through a situation like that with a client, they’ll give you the loyalty back.
I certainly look back at the deals because they’re hugely intensive situations that leave a mark on you. Normally, it’s public M&A as they’re the most dynamic, high-profile cases. So the bid defences, two of them with Marks and Spencer, those I remember well.
The bid defence of Charter when it was bid for by Melrose – that was a very difficult transaction. Recent deals in the last year: RPC, which is currently being taken over by Berry, there was a first bid by Apollo and that was an extremely challenging transaction – without us that deal wouldn’t have happened.
When you get to my stage you need something to energise you. Being head of corporate means I’m doing all the client work I’ve ever done but also handling these other responsibilities. It means you can look at the firm’s longer-term interests and help cultivate younger talent.
The firm is in a really good place. There are anxieties about the changing world, technology and disruption. But I think the high-end lawyering we do will be among the less-affected areas. As a firm we’ve got probably the best group of partners I’ve seen in my time at Slaughters.
Brexit is hard to comment on. It’s so frustrating to see what’s happened the last three years. But I do believe we’ll exit one way or another, probably by the end of this year. Then there is a chance of a positive future where the UK can reset as an outward-looking, globally-focused, vibrant economy with a positive future. The City will remain strong in the medium term, the flight of the banks has been overstated, we have the infrastructure here, the language, time zones and all the benefits.
We’ve been looking closely at US law firms for 15 years. The accountants came along and were a threat and then weren’t. There are signs some US firms are slowing their investment. The really established New York deal shops are not present in the UK doing English law. The others all face similar problems in London in that they’ve had one or two big-name partners. Many have a major challenge around whether they can find similar big-name partners and, do they want to make that investment? There’s little evidence they are going to form a real challenge to what we do.
Then you have Latham and Kirkland. Latham is making a play to act for corporate Britain on a full-service basis. It’s the one US firm that’s trying to do it and who’s to say it won’t be successful? But it’s a hard market to break into.
Kirkland has made a massive impact in New York. Everyone there is talking about Kirkland. In London what it’s trying to do is build their European private equity platform and it is doing that successfully. The question will be if it tries in time to move out into public M&A. It hasn’t tried yet, but it might in time and that will be very interesting.
I go to Reading Festival with my kids; these days they stay in a tent and I stay in a hotel with a minibar and a shower.
Unless you’re an unusual sort of person – and some lawyers are unusual – it’s impossible to forge a career without a proper balance. I’ve been 32 years at Slaughters this September. You can’t sustain that and keep your interest and hunger unless you have interests outside the law.
I make sure I have a rounded life. I have a family and three kids, lots of interests. I work hard to carve out time to pursue other interests.
No client wants to find they have a lawyer who is their primary contact point at Slaughters [with] no personality and nothing to discuss. You want to try be the sort of person a client wants to talk to, not just about legal matters but anything.
My interests are narrower than some. I went to an art exhibition for female clients we staged at the V&A. And one of the clients bumped into me and said: ‘My God, Andy, what on earth are you doing here? This is culture!’ I said: ‘I am the most cultured person in this room. What do you think British culture is? It’s football, rock music and beer – I tick all three.’
I used to play right fullback. My ambition as a kid was to play for Mansfield Town. I still have dreams where I’m on the pitch for Mansfield, but I was never remotely good enough.
I play a lot of tennis with my son. He’s getting better and better. He has lessons, which I’m going to have to stop because I used to beat him, but he got closer and closer, and this year he’s started beating me. But the last three matches I’ve won, I’m using psychological warfare.
I’m very interested in wildlife and conservation. One day when I get out of this place that will be a big part of my life. I’d love to own some land and give it back to nature. A lot of my holidays are wildlife-orientated. I do a safari every year with my son. We’re off to Zimbabwe in August.
When I’m out of the office I want to be doing dynamic things outside. I go to a lot of festivals and gigs. I follow rock music closely and I brainwashed my kids away from the Justin Bieber route, but I started very early. I go to Reading Festival with them; these days they stay in a tent and I stay in a hotel with a minibar and a shower.
Andy Ryde is head of corporate at Slaughter and May