Legal Salary Surveys
In-house legal salary surveys - 2023
BCL Legal undertakes research into legal professional salaries and benefits by region on an annual basis.
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- North West - In-house
- Yorkshire & North East - In-house
- Midlands - In-house
- Northern Home Counties - In-house
Reflecting on 2022...
Stuart Anderson, principal writer for BCL's The Brief and director of professional services specialist Alpha Public Relations, reviews BCL Legal’s 2022 in-house salary survey...
Read Mark Levine's in-house salary round-up for 2022 here.
In the in-house space, BCL’s in-house managing director Mark Levine points out that the current rate of salary increases is in large part a result of firms having retreated from training lawyers in commercial contracts in the aftermath of the financial crisis of 2008-09. This resulted in a period of around six years in which very few newly qualified solicitors had this vital skill for in-house roles.
This has combined with the recruitment rebound since the pandemic to mean there is a serious mismatch between demand and supply for junior and mid-level lawyers who have the potential to move in-house and hit the ground running. The result has been salary increases of 20-40 per cent for junior to mid-level in-house counsel, and 15-20 per cent for senior lawyers.
However, while salary increases have been impressive, Mark also points out that even larger corporate employers can’t compete with the salaries paid by City and international law firms. National firms are, therefore, the benchmark against which most in-house salaries should be measured – and with which employers are competing.