Case History: Quickly and Quietly Staffing Three New Offices

How Eastridge helped a global law firm in a niche specialty staff three new offices from the ground up while maintaining client confidentiality

Confidentiality is essential to the practice of law, and this can apply just as much in legal staffing. One leading international law firm turned to Eastridge to staff three new branches it was building from the ground up without making any public job postings, maintaining complete confidentiality until the very end of the interviewing process. Added to this challenge would be finding the high volume of lawyers and legal assistants with experience in several highly specialized practice areas, which are rare for the region the firm was expanding into. 

To find the right candidates while keeping the client’s name confidential, Eastridge’s Legal Recruiting Team drew from their extensive networks built up over 35 years, including from the nearby university, and from the company’s existing talent pool. Recruiters met confidentially with all candidates and sourced the gamut of open positions, including lawyers, legal assistants, as well as billing, HR and marketing professionals, ensuring the client had the requisite staff to open its doors on time.

Challenges

In order to complete a major regional expansion, the firm needed to address several key challenges:

• Dozens of Specialized Positions to Fill Urgently. The client needed to source talent to staff all 3 offices at once. Positions included receptionists, marketing managers, business development managers, accounting managers, legal assistants and attorneys.
• Strict Confidentiality Required. Some attorneys were leaving other firms to join this firm, so to prevent any disruption in legal services behind the scenes, the team had to source candidates without naming the hiring firm or publicly posting job requisitions.
• Limited Overall Talent Pool. Because the firm was hiring in a niche legal practice area, there were few qualified candidates practicing or available in the region.
  

Solutions 

The Eastridge Professional Recruiting Team found the right candidates in the time frame required by the client, by doing the following:

• Leveraged Legal Expertise and Network. Drawing on its 35 years in legal staffing, the Eastridge team had experience hiring in the niche practice area required by the client, and leveraged their extensive network and resources to find the high volume of qualified and available candidates while keeping the client’s identity strictly confidential.
• Strategies for Sourcing Talent While Maintaining Client Confidentiality.   The Eastridge team was able to position the benefits, sophistication of the law firm’s supporting technology and caliber of clients, as well as the strength of the attorneys they’d be working with to entice candidates without revealing the client’s name.

“We understood how critical confidentiality would be for both the client and the interviewing candidates, so we drew from our extensive talent networks, including from regional universities and professional organizations, as well as our internal talent pools to staff all 3 branches on time and without publishing a single job posting.”

 – Abigail Parente, Market Manager, Legal Division, Eastridge

Results

Eastridge sourced the needed talent so that the firm could open its three new branches on time. The client has been able to build up its operations starting from this foundation from opening day on an ongoing basis. In addition, the Eastridge Professional Recruiting Team delivered the following results:

• Recruiters met confidentially with all candidates, preserving the confidentiality of both the client firm and the candidates
• Sourced all open roles to staff each of the 3 offices from the ground up, from entry-level roles to senior legal roles 
• Eastridge’s efficiency in sourcing talent allowed the firm to open its 3 new branches on time 

About Eastridge

Established in 1972, Eastridge Workforce Solutions is an employee-owned provider of full-service talent acquisition and management solutions for companies globally. Eastridge provides a full range of solutions solving today's workforce challenges.  In addition to professional / technical and industrial recruiting we provide workforce management solutions such as payrolling, recruitment process outsourcing, as well as master service provider and vendor management systems programs.  We back our services with the Eastridge Cloud, a proprietary technology that streamlines every step of workforce management. Eastridge proudly helps over 20,000 associates find jobs annually across the globe.