International giant’s new incarnation is on a recruitment drive
King & Wood Mallesons’ (KWM) new London office is touting paralegal roles to aspiring lawyers who secured training contract offers with the old firm, but had these offers cancelled when it went under.
Earlier this year and after much speculation, KWM’s beleaguered Europe, UK & the Middle East (EUME) arm finally entered into administration. However, thanks to a rescue mission first revealed by Legal Cheek, all the firm’s 60 or so stranded trainees were taken on elsewhere.
The same however could not be said for the now defunct outfit’s future trainees. Having had their training contract offers rescinded, KWM’s now ex-future trainees are having to undertake the dreaded application process all over again.
Fast forward several months, and the firm’s global incarnation is now encouraging the same group of wannabe lawyers to apply for trainee roles paralegal positions at its new London office, which opened just a day after KWM EUME formally entered into administration. This is possible because China-led KWM Global has always been a separate legal entity to KWM EUME.
A spokesperson for KWM 2.0 (not the firm’s official name) told Legal Cheek:
We have contacted UK-based trainees who had been offered roles at the legacy KWM EUME firm to invite them to paralegal for our new firm. We wanted to first reach out to those impacted by the administration before going to market. We have had a number of applications, all of which we are interviewing.
Probed as to why the firm — which is based in new digs at Octagon Point, St Paul’s — didn’t offer training contracts, the spokesperson continued:
We are not in a position to comment any further at this stage regarding training contracts because, being a new firm, it is only right and proper that we assess how best to meet our own and potential future trainee needs.
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