Read below about our recent inclusion in the annual Sunday Times Best Places to work 2024:
James Legal, a Hull and East Yorkshire-based law firm are proud to be named by the Sunday Times in the Top 100 Best Places To Work in the small business category on their first attempt.
The 27-strong workforce spread across offices in Hull and Beverley voted James Legal a comfortable 98% overall satisfaction rate on feeling respected and an overwhelming 99% satisfaction on the good relationship with their managers. In almost all 17 categories colleagues consistently nominated the independent practice in the top 10 percentile in the country including 95% job satisfaction, feeling empowered, confidence in management and instilled with pride.
Simon Young, Managing Director is thrilled with the result.
‘We decided to carry out a satisfaction survey of all our staff to ensure that we had a clear picture of how they were feeling and whether there was anything we were missing or needed to do to maintain and improve morale, engagement and retainment. It coincided with the opening of WorkL entries for The Sunday Times Best Places to Work which posed the same sort of questions. It made sense to use their tried and tested model. I am delighted with the response. It exceeded our expectations and is reassuring to know that our colleagues are as happy as they appear. Knowing 99% feel happy and safe in their working environment is fantastic’.
Work/life balance and good mental health is an important foundation of the company established by CEO, Nick Miller in 2009 with a team of just four initially. ‘I had worked for many years in well-respected law firms, reaching a relatively high professional level. Whilst I was successful, I didn’t feel happy and I realised that this didn’t matter within those organisations. I set up James Legal to address that and made it my aim to ensure that everyone who came to work with me had the chance to thrive and develop both professionally and personally. To achieve a wellbeing score of just 5% at risk of having poor mental health compared to a 40% industry average is the standout result to me. Knowing the team at James Legal are over 8 times safer from poor wellbeing due to work is immensely satisfying’.
The company has a particular focus on developing young professionals with an eye to collaborating as a team and becoming the individual they aspire to be. They do this by supporting them in their sporting and personal achievements, enabling hybrid flexible working, generous bonus schemes, private health care, free legal services, annual trips abroad and away days and dog-friendly offices.
‘We’re ultimately selling a service,’ says Simon. ‘People buy from people and if everyone is happy, the service they deliver will be better, staff and client retention higher within a pleasant and supportive environment. The biggest challenge currently is setting up a pet rota to ensure our canine colleagues feel equally included’.
To be successfully accredited as a Sunday Times Best Place to Work, organisations had to achieve a minimum 70 per cent overall engagement score with benchmarking data drawn from more than 70,000 organisations.
James Legal achieved an average engagement score of 92% putting them 21% above the industry standard for companies of a similar size and being accredited as Excellent in all spotlighted fields. Almost all respondents were categorised as enthusiastic remainers, that is people who feel both rewarded and have a good relationship with their line manager and the vast majority also designated as active promoters of the company to friends and family.
Nick Miller is not complacent ‘There are always things that can be done to make things even better. Legal work by its very nature is stressful and it is our job to manage that stress for our clients and colleagues’. For that reason, Nick is currently halfway through a Masters diploma in counselling and actively encourages everyone to seek out strategies, therapies and self-care to maintain and improve mental and physical wellbeing.
‘We didn’t do this just to get a badge, though we will take it’ says Simon. ‘We wanted to know how our team were feeling and whether there were any hidden issues that needed work. It is fantastic to be voted so overwhelmingly high by everyone in every field. I see our job now is to maintain and build on that so the results are even better next year’.
James Legal are a legal services company providing conveyancing, litigation, employment, matrimonial and private client assistance to companies and individuals. They can be contacted on 01482 225566 or info@jameslegal.co.uk for free initial advice with no obligation.
