Norton Rose Fulbright looks to the future with new Next Generation Board

Norton Rose Fulbright in Europe, Middle East and Asia (EMEA) has launched a Next Generation Board to shape the firm for the future and drive innovation. 

The purpose of the Next Generation Board is to influence and inform the EMEA Management Committee’s priorities and initiatives, and to share ideas as to how to improve the firm and drive collaboration. The Board is composed of 16 members from across EMEA, comprising 11 lawyers (below counsel level) and five business services staff (below director levels). 

The group meets once a month and is joined by the managing partner, Peter Scott, and other invited members of the management team, every other month. One of the focus areas for the Next Generation Board as it starts its work is to explore how the firm’s lawyers and business services professionals can work even more closely together to embed a “one team” approach to serve clients. Practical steps to achieve this “one team” approach that the Next Generation Board are exploring include training and secondments between teams and embedding and rotating business services teams with the legal teams (as the firm progresses further with its hybrid work model).

The creation of the Next Generation Board follows other recent initiatives from the firm in EMEA, including the increase to the ‘investment’ hours that count towards bonus thresholds from 100 to 125 a year. Bonus-eligible hours now include innovation work as part that investment time, as well as pro bono, knowledge, CSR and D&I work. 

Norton Rose Fulbright has also replaced the traditional annual appraisal with a Roadmap discussion that now takes place three times a year to enable more dynamic, prompt and clear feedback. 

Peter Scott commented: “Our new Next Generation Board will bring additional diversity of ideas from our talented people and support new ways of thinking which will grow our firm for the future. We want to encourage our people to share their views to help shape our business for the future and in the post-pandemic ways of working. 

“This follows changes we made to our bonus system to encourage our associates to spend more time on innovation and values-based activities. We want to embed opportunities for all our people to develop a broader range of skillsets and contribute to the strategic development of our business.”

Jamie Cooke, a senior associate in the London antitrust & competition team, and Kirsty Watson, a practice support manager in London, co-chair the Next Generation Board. 

Jamie Cooke commented: “This is an exciting opportunity for me and my fellow Board members. We look forward to providing fresh perspectives and contributing to the development of initiatives that will make the firm an even more dynamic and inclusive place to work.” 

Kirsty Watson commented: “It’s great to have our voice heard within the firm. Speaking as a member of our business services team, I know how much talent there is across the firm that’s playing such an important and active role in delivering for our clients. I’m looking forward to bringing our ideas to the firm’s management to continue to improve how we operate.” 

The 16 Next Generation Board members include:

• Aditya Badami, senior associate, litigation and disputes, London 
• Ben Carrozzi, senior associate, projects, London 
• Sara Collins, head of legal design, London 
• Jamie Cooke, senior associate, antitrust and competition, London 
• Claudia Culley, associate, investigations, white collar and litigation, London 
• Hannah Culshaw, associate, corporate, M&A and securities, London 
• Vinod Dabasia, EMEA head of IT service delivery, London 
• Kamya Gopal, trainee solicitor, London 
• Suzie Kemp, senior associate, pensions, Newcastle 
• Eugene Low, head of finance, Asia, Singapore 
• Michelle Muyunda, diversity and inclusion advisor, London 
• Michel Pflieger, senior associate, antitrust and competition, Paris 
• Julia Tschickardt, associate, banking and finance, Frankfurt 
• Tamara Ubink, associate, banking and finance, Amsterdam 
• Kirsty Watson, practice support manager, London 
• Patrick Wong, senior associate, corporate, M&A and securities, Hong Kong