Solving the patent attorney demographic crisis. By Pete Fellows
When the financial meltdown hit in 2008, patent firms in the UK, being a relatively conservative bunch, arguably made some reactionary decisions which has had an impact on the profession ever since. There were some firms that made redundancies, typically cutting more junior members of staff – those not yet qualified, and/or cancelling graduate hires. This was an understandable reaction to the new circumstances everyone faced and as a one-time measure may not have had too much of an impact. It is what happened next that has really caused the difficulties. From 2008 until at least 2011 graduate entry went down significantly. Partners overcompensated for a reduction in short term income or, even worse, a fear that a reduction in income might occur. This has had far reaching ramifications. A casual look through firm websites and you will see that there are plenty of attorneys starting out in the profession (graduate intake has been up for the last year or so) and a decent number at senior associate or junior partner level. But now a great deal of firms simply can’t find attorneys at the 3 years’ experience (almost qualified) to 5 years’ experience (0-1 years pqe) level.
This has impacted firms in an inconsistent way. For the most part work within electronics, despite initial pessimism (and I wasn’t entirely immune from this), has remained consistent if not grown since 2008 – this is certainly the case for the majority of UK firms although some have lost work and remarkably made redundancies in this area in recent years. For engineers, the first few years post the recession were very lean in respect to hiring at any level but now there is huge demand with little supply, particularly within the remit under discussion. Chemistry and biotechnology positions (particularly the latter) have for the most part not been plentiful but if anything this has made matters worse as a significant demographic gap in these areas has made it very difficult for firms to find good people when positions do arise.
On an individual basis the solution for firms varies. In technical areas in high demand (for example a newly qualified attorney with a technical background in electronics) such is the competition that it can be very difficult for firms to persuade someone to join them even if they take extraordinary steps such as breaking their salary structure. Where possible (and there is ample anecdotal evidence that this is happening) firms are addressing the issue by recruiting more graduates, investing more in training and coping with the difficulties this provides in the short term. From a personal point of view I would encourage more firms to look overseas, whilst there will clearly be knowledge deficiencies in some areas, recruiting an overseas qualified attorney will, in many cases, be much more immediately productive than a local graduate. There can be ancillary benefits as well, such as US qualified Patent Attorneys helping further build a US foreign associate network or gaining direct instructions from relationships with US corporations without alienating US associate relationships that already exist for the firm.
In respect to our own business we have had a significant increase in retained search instructions. The obvious advantage being that we can potentially speak to someone before they are actively looking for a position and persuade them of the merits of the job we are recruiting for before they encounter a myriad of opinion from a range of different recruiters when they are seeking a new role. The overwhelming majority of our competitors work only on a ‘no win, no fee’ basis. ‘No win, no fee’ can sometimes mean that it may be in ones interest as a recruiter to move candidates to a firm who are more straightforward in their sellable virtues to maximise the chances of being successful instead of working on all projects equally or really spending time talking through a firm and the opportunities there in a tremendous amount of detail. There are extenuating circumstances of course – good relationships with a firm will mean that recruiters sell those clients more effectively to candidates and are more invested in doing so and other factors such as exclusivity or the promise of more work can help encourage your recruitment suppliers to sell your firms best.
That is not to say that there is anything wrong with a ‘no win, no fee’ business model – a substantial amount of our business relies upon it and there are definite benefits to be found using this model. But retained recruitment does present some significant advantages for private practice and recruiter alike.
The IP recruitment market has changed significantly since I first started working within this sector in 2006: there seem to be more recruitment companies but many of these are offering essentially the same thing – a not particularly bespoke service and quite often providing the same candidates as everyone else to a whole range of firms that, as a client, you have to compete with.
Without sounding too Jerry Maguire, the solution for Fellows and Associates has been a more tailored approach working with select clients. Realising that from a candidate perspective, yes like many of our competitors, we can represent you to everyone on the market but that where we have a close relationship we can significantly increase your chances of securing the position you want. From a client perspective we are able to find candidates that others can’t with a more proactive, innovative approach, all that we ask is a little commitment on your part.
Finally, we have heard from a number of clients about a spectacularly poor approach to headhunting by a number of other recruitment firms. To some extent it’s a lost art form – many of the recruiters working today have never had formal training on search and selection so are essentially ‘winging it’. There’s nothing wrong with that per se unless it goes wrong and then there is the potential of not only reputational damage to the recruiter but also to the client they are representing. In quite a few instances I am not entirely sure if these recruiters have permission to be headhunting in the first place. At best they may have been instructed on a ‘no win, no fee’ basis and are pretending that the instruction is more exclusive or at worst they may not even have this commitment and have simply heard that a firm might be recruiting.
There is more to effective search than simply cold calling a prospective candidate – whilst this is necessary on occasion as part of search, a much more informed approach not entirely reliant on cold calling will yield a much better result.
Hopefully this article won’t be read as a disingenuous attempt to sell us as being good and everyone else as bad – that really is not my intention. I feel I should comment on my sector and I do believe in what am I doing so that passion could certainly be mistakenly interpreted that way. There are a number of really excellent ‘no win, no fee’ recruiters out there and I hope others would include us on that list. However, I do think that many of those embarking in retained search particularly on an ad hoc basis really don’t know what they are doing. Whilst that can present opportunity for us it can also present difficulties, if someone engages a recruiter in running a campaign that is not fit for purpose it may dissuade that company from ever taking that sort of risk again. But betting on a campaign based recruitment project may help you beat the demographic gap. Avoiding the risk of losing money paid in advance means that your opportunities to secure the best candidates on the market may be much more limited.