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Edwards Gibson featured in Financial Times exposé on gender disparity in top-tier legal hiring

We are pleased to share that Edwards Gibson has been cited in a recent Financial Times article authored by Suzi Ring titled, “UK corporate law firms hire mostly men for highest-paid roles”. The piece investigates the entrenched gender imbalance in lateral partner hiring across the UK’s most lucrative legal practice areas – particularly corporate and finance.

Despite women representing a substantial portion of the legal workforce, our market analysis – referenced in the FT – shows that they accounted for just 20% of partner hires between 2019 and 2024 in the highest paying teams at law firms. The data reveals a persistent imbalance in senior hiring, one that continues to favour male candidates despite widespread diversity pledges.

Drawing on various sources, the article explores the reasons behind this disparity, focusing on the challenges of balancing primary carer responsibilities with the long and unpredictable hours required for deal-focused roles. It also touches on another factor that we, as headhunters, know well: the methodology law firms use to assess a partner’s value, while ostensibly objective, tends to favour men over women.

This is because — contrary to what some law firms claim — external partner hires are rarely about “filling skill-set gaps” and almost always about “buying books of business.” A partner’s value is therefore largely determined by their personal business case. And the reality is that women, who are often more risk-averse or less inclined toward hyperbole, tend to understate the size of their portable practice compared to men.  

Edwards Gibson’s director, Scott Gibson, provided commentary on the structural and cultural dynamics underpinning this trend. His observations offer a data-informed perspective on the hiring process challenges women face in securing senior roles:

“Men tend to be far more optimistic about the size of their client followings,”

This mindset, Gibson explains, influences both self-selection and the hiring decisions made by firms – and ultimately, the compensation that is offered:

“As a general rule, we multiply a man’s business case by 0.8 and a woman’s by 1.2.”

This adjustment, based on observed patterns in performance and delivery, adds a behavioural dimension to the data and helps to explain why the gender gap persists even as law firm firms publicly commit to improving representation.

Read the full Financial Times article here (paywall).

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