Firstly, there is flexibility in terms of time and work, which is critical and allows me to work around my other clients.
Secondly, the nature of the work that I can get involved in, from the familiar to the new, provides the variety I am looking for.
Thirdly, the quality of AG’s clients and work means you deal with great people on quality assignments. Finally, my long-standing affiliation with AG and the superb AG team means this is the place I want to be.
This is your first engagement with AG Integrate, how would you describe your overall onboarding experience, from the first point of contact to joining the client, to your monthly check-ins with the team?
The process has been slick. Having worked for so long as an AG client, I was lucky enough to be able to procure references from a couple of the partners I had worked with to get things going.
The AG Integrate team is very organised and onboarding was easy, including typical on-line training. It has also been probably the easiest onboarding from an IT perspective I have ever had – up and running immediately.
The monthly check-ins are useful as a means to keep in touch with the AG Integrate team and iron out any issues (there aren’t many, but it does start to get complicated if working on simultaneous assignments on different terms). I would say that the way the whole process is run I not only feel a part of AG Integrate, but I also really feel a part of AG.
What aspects of your current assignment are you enjoying the most?
My current assignment is an AG Integrate secondment to one of AG's client - an elite Premier League football club. Obviously, this is a highly visible client, who are in the media on a daily basis. This, plus working at the club’s stadium, for a business that has sporting performance and achievement at the centre of everything, makes the whole experience a little “out of the ordinary”.
My role is to support, often acting as internal client, on property / real estate issues throughout the club, including setting up a major development project. I think my broad legal, but also commercial, experience across relevant areas has enabled AG to provide a secondee that might be slightly different from the typical resource, and hopefully one that meets the diverse needs of the client.
The secondment was full time for four months initially and is now two days a week ongoing. I believe the role adds real value to the client, as the remainder of the in-house legal team are corporate / commercial / regulatory lawyers with little real estate or development experience.
It also provides and enables AG to deepen and develop the client relationship. I am enjoying the arrangement enormously and learning a lot at the same time.
What does your career as a consultant hold for you next?
I would simply like to continue working with a great set of colleagues, for great clients doing interesting work, taking the opportunities that come up to expand my experience and expertise.
What are some of the key trends you see impacting the current Real Estate legal market?
There is a historic fundamental shortage of residential accommodation, and with institutional funds increasingly expanding into this sector and economic headwinds starting to look favourable.
Advice on how to navigate through the Building Safety Act implications is desperately needed by clients at this time, from contractors through to owners. Again, this is an area where AG is expert.
AG are incredibly well-placed to provide a “one-stop shop” for legal advice on efficient corporate structures, purchases and sales, property management and regulatory compliance, as well as supporting new development opportunities and introducing potential new funding structures. The future in this area seems really exciting to me.
We’d love to learn more about yourself. Could you share with us what you enjoy doing in your free time outside of your professional life?
Well, I recently got married, so the last year has been mainly about planning and preparing for it and our honeymoon in Africa. AG even had a role to play in that, as I met my wife through work when she was a lawyer there!
I have two children and love spending time with them – one is a teenage girl who loves reading and shopping but is generally quite quiet, the other is an 11-year-old boy / Duracell bunny, and so weekends are often spent playing football or cricket for hours (and hours) on end. We recently came third in the annual parent / child cricket club tournament, a performance of which we are very proud and will sadly unlikely achieve again.
When I get some time to myself, I enjoy tinkering with old cars. My wife would no doubt suggest I have too many, something I would strongly disagree with, although perhaps more of them actually running would be nice…
