High-performing partners have heard the siren call of suitors echo around the marketplace this year. Lawyers Weekly presents 20 of the most notable Movers & Shakers of 2013.

I tell ya, there is just no loyalty anymore.

No, this is not the frustrated refrain from a taciturn football coach as he watches a star player sign with a rival but, rather, what could be heard between gnashing teeth from the senior partners at many, many law firms this year.

2013 has seen an unprecedented number of partners from firms of all sizes switch to, well, firms of all sizes.

The big end of town has been suffering just as much as the mid-tier and smaller firms.

Just like a footballer that leaves the English Premier League to play in the United Arab Emirates, many partners have left global firms to join less glamorous smaller firms on the promise of more money and more work.

It is certainly easier to be in the First X1 and feel the love of the coach in a small squad than one that has hundreds of players.

Speaking to Lawyers Weekly earlier this year, Addisons managing partner Laura Hartley said that she had “never had so much coffee in her life” as she was regularly meeting with lawyers from other firms, bigger firms, who were scoping out a change of scene.

“We have been approached by more partners than at any other time that have been disaffected by an international merger,” said Hartley, whose firm has a single office in Sydney. “They cite the international merger as the reason for their feelings of unhappiness on a number of levels.”

One of the lawyers Hartley poached was Arthur Davis from Norton Rose Fulbright, a partner of almost a decade’s standing at the global firm.

Davis is one of many partners featured in this year’s list of the top Movers + Shakers that have left global firms to join boutique outfits.

However, the big boys have also flexed their muscles regularly.

Allen & Overy and Gilbert + Tobin are two large firms that have taken some of Australia’s best senior legal talent this year but, as you will see, they also feature  on our list of partners lost as well as partners gained.

With firms not shy about moving underperforming partners on at the same time as many of their stars were looking at pastures green, 2013 provided unprecedented levels of senior partner movement.

Out of the frying pan....

Who: Dave Poddar
Departed: Allen & Overy
Joined: Clifford Chance

Lawyers Weekly was gobsmacked when it learnt that Dave Poddar (pictured top), whom Lawyers Weekly exclusively revealed had left A&O under a cloud in October 2012, turned up at the firm’s Magic Circle rival Clifford Chance in January.

There is no doubt Poddar is one of Australia’s most pre-eminent competition lawyers. However, the former King & Wood Mallesons partner comes with some significant baggage from his time with both KWM and A&O.

“We conducted, as we do with any lateral hire, extensive due diligence, which involved talking to clients and talking to former employees that have worked with the candidate,” said Michael Lishman, the head of Clifford Chance in Perth, who said that the firm had spoken to people who had served in the partnership at both A&O and KWM. “There are people who have worked with him over the years who love him and sing his praises ... I would have been very proud if I had my clients and people say those things about me.”

There are also many folks who don’t sing his praises, Michael...

Who: Andrea Beatty
Departed: HWL Ebsworth
Joined: K&L Gates
 

Andrea Beatty is another senior lawyer who found new digs in January, and who has also divided opinion among colleagues.

Lawyers Weekly has spoken to people who loved working for her, and others who didn’t so much.Beatty was the head of the financial services and regulatory practice group at HWL Ebsworth, and she has always maintained that she is not difficult to work with. “I think we are very much a team of people that are collaborative, honest, hardworking and trustworthy ... we also have a lot of fun, we do a lot of social things together,” she told Lawyers Weekly.

Who: Michael Barratt
Departed: Finlaysons
Joined: Thomsons Lawyers
 

While Clifford Chance and K&L denied their new recruits were difficult customers, when Thomsons Lawyers poached Barratt, the head of Finlaysons’ banking and finance team in Adelaide, they saw his reputation as being a tough litigator and tough guy to work with as a badge of honour.

“He’s a very competitive person and where the competition’s hot and it’s tough, of course, rivals might have a particular view of him,” Thomsons’ chief executive partner Adrian Tembel told Lawyers Weekly in February.

Who: Julian Blanchard
Departed: Billabong
Joined: Wyndham Vacation Resorts
 

No issues with former colleagues here, but no one could begrudge Billabong general counsel Julian Blanchard taking his legal board elsewhere in January. With the iconic surf brand trying to paddle through stormy waters (sorry for the puns folks), Blanchard decided he didn’t need the hassle and took off to Wyndham Vacation Resorts, one of the world’s largest hospitality companies. Looks like that surfboard might still come in handy...

New kids on the block

Who: Justine Turnbull
Departed: Herbert Smith Freehills
Joined: Seyfarth Shaw

In June, US cross-border specialist Seyfarth Shaw announced it was doubling its international offices from two to four by launching its Australian practice with digs in Sydney and Melbourne. Justine Turnbull, a highly-rated partner in the HSF employment, pensions and incentives group, was one of four partners from the firm that were leaving their newly-monikered global firm to join a new one. Seyfarth Shaw also took Ashurst partners Rachel Bernasconi and Michael Tamvakologos, and Arnold Bloch Leibler partner Henry Skene.
Today (12 December) Seyfarth Shaw officially launched its Australian practice.

Who: Michelle Fox
Departed: Herbert Smith Freehills
Joined: Quinn Emanuel Urquhart & Sullivan
 

Just prior to the Seyfarth Shaw news, Quinn Emanuel announced its plans to open in Australia in May. The American litigation specialists took Michael Mills and Michelle Fox from HSF, who had both previously co-headed the firm’s insurance and product liability practice in Sydney. In December Quinn Emanuel further boosted its Australian stocks by taking KWM’s global head of dispute resolution, Beau Deleuil.

Who: David Rennick
Departed: Maddocks
Joined: Pinsent Masons

This one is fresh off the press.

This month Lawyers Weekly exclusively broke the story that Maddocks CEO David Rennick was quitting the firm to join Pinsent Masons, the English global. Both firms were initially in merger talks, but that broke down when it was clear the bulk of the Maddocks’ partnership were in no mood to go global ... yet. Despite this setback, Pinsent Masons is still determined to enter Oz next year, and it is expected Rennick will be one of the firm’s senior partners.

Stay tuned folks.

Where the hell did that come from?

Who: John Kettle
Departed: Mason Hayes & Curran
Joined: McCullough Robertson

An Irishman walks into a Queensland firm and, well, that’s the story.

No joke, John Kettle, a man who once successfully took FIFA to the International Sports Tribunal in Lausanne, Switzerland resulting in the changing of their player transfer rules, joined McCullough Robertson in February. Prior to heading Down Under, Kettle ran the London office of Irish firm Mason Hayes & Curran. So why come to Australia, John? “I saw there was space there for a strong independent firm like the one I’ve joined; it was too good to turn down,” he told Lawyers Weekly. Kettle is based in Brisbane, McCullough Robertson’s largest office, and heads the firm’s international group. McCullough Robertson also has digs in Sydney.

Who: Malcolm Shelton-Agar
Departed: Allen & Gledhill
Joined: Jackson McDonald
 

Malcolm Shelton-Agar was the COO at the top-tier Singapore firm Allen & Gledhill. Prior to that, he was the managing partner and managing director of national firm Phillips Fox for over a decade prior to its merger with DLA Piper. In July, he left the confines of Allen & Gledhill to become the head of Jackson McDonald, Western Australia’s largest independent law firm.

“I’m looking forward to riding horses again, I used to ride horses a bit when I was in Sydney, keeping fit ... and I’ve always been a passionate reader,” he told Lawyers Weekly when recounting why he wanted to return home.

Despite assuming a high-profile position in WA’s business community, Shelton-Agar is only the second most famous Agar in the state. In July, 19-year-old Perth law student Ashton Agar scored 98 on his test debut against England.

Boutique call

Who: John Hutchinson
Departed: DLA Piper
Joined: Hall & Wilcox
 

The corporate and financial services specialist has an enviable legal CV. Prior to being a partner at DLA, John Hutchinson was a partner at Baker & McKenzie and HSF. He was also a former general counsel at Centro Properties Group, which he is probably not too disappointed to have left given the Group’s corporate troubles recently. Anyway, Hutchinson is one of several partners to have left DLA this year, taking clients such as ING Investment Management and Morgan Stanley Real Estate with him. “People [at DLA] are looking at all sorts of different things: they have a focus on sourcing cross-border transactions ... those global networks aren’t vital to my work,” he told Lawyers Weekly in February.

Who: Vicki Grey
Departed: Gadens Lawyers
Joined: Kemp Strang

Vicki Grey is one of Australia’s top handful of financial services lawyers. When Lawyers Weekly heard around the traps that she was leaving the financial services powerhouse of Gadens, a national firm let’s not forget, in May to join the fledgling financial services practice at Kemp Strang, eyebrows were raised. “

The ability for me to have a say in the ... strategic direction of the partnership at Kemp Strang, I find that very exciting,” she told Lawyers Weekly when we exclusively broke the story announcing she was leaving.
 

At Gadens, Grey worked with more than a dozen lenders in developing their SMSF lending policies. Those clients include the Big Four domestic banks, the Bank of Queensland and HSBC.

Who: Andrew Christopher
Departed: Baker & McKenzie
Joined: Webb Henderson
 

Andrew Christopher was the former national practice manager of competition law and disputes at Bakers Australia. He told Lawyers Weekly that it was Webb Henderson’s “international coverage on a boutique scale” that attracted him to the firm.

“I think it’s a big driver for a lot of senior lawyers who crave or miss the opportunity to have daily and routine dealings with clients,” he said. Webb Henderson has a tick over 30 lawyers working across offices in Singapore, London, Sydney and Auckland. Telecommunications, dispute resolution and competition law are its key areas of competency.

Who: Arthur Davis
Departed: Norton Rose Fulbright
Joined: Addisons
 

One of the disaffected partners Addisons head Laura Hartley was having coffee with was Arthur Davis from Norton Rose Fulbright. He was at NRF for around 10 years and has around 20 years’ experience in large-scale corporate and commercial transactions. In recent times, Addisons has also nabbed David O’Donnell from KWM and Mal Fielding from Maddocks.

Changing the deck chairs on the big firm titanic

Who: Craig Semple
Departed: King & Wood Mallesons
Joined: Gilbert + Tobin

Craig Semple is highly regarded by those in the know.

Not only because he is one of Australia’s best M&A lawyers, but also because he has a penchant for REM, particularly their 80s stuff, when lead singer Michael Stipe still had long hair.

Semple, who still has a thick hatch on top, was part of the furniture at KWM. He was formerly the head of the firm’s national M&A group and has a high-powered national and international client base. Semple was one of several high-profile partner departures at KWM this year, with Australian managing partner Tony O’Malley among the coterie of departing lawyers. Semple won’t have his welcome morning tea at G+T until January.

Who: Janet Whiting
Departed: Corrs Chambers Westgarth
Joined: Gilbert + Tobin
 

Haven’t Corrs had a tumultuous year! They have lost truckloads of partners, and also brought in a few. The firm won’t be sorry to see some of the defectors leave, but that can’t be said of Janet Whiting, who led the firm’s Melbourne disputes and litigation team. She will now head the litigation practice of G+T in Melbourne.

Who: Bryan Pointon
Departed: Gilbert + Tobin
Joined: DLA Piper
 

Haven’t G+T had a tumultuous year! They have lost truckloads of partners and, well, you know the rest. Pointon, a leading private equity lawyer was one of the top dogs at G+T, and joined DLA in September to head its corporate Asia-Pacific practice. What a tumultuous year it’s been for DLA…

Who: Mark van Brakel
Departed: Corrs Chambers Westgarth
Joined: Allen & Overy
 

The man with the international name joined the international firm. The energy & resources and litigation specialist will be based in Perth. He was a partner at Corrs for just over three years.

Who: Peter McDonald
Departed: Herbert Smith Freehills
Joined: Allen & Overy
 

Sydneysider McDonald was poached by A&O to head the firm’s antitrust and competition practice in Australia. It has certainly been a trying year for HSF. The firm initiated pay freezes across the country earlier this year and is not the only firm to have three partners make our list of the top 20 departing partners.

Who: Robert Clarke
Departed: Allens
Joined: Corrs Chambers Westgarth
 

Robert Clarke was a former managing partner of Allens’ Singapore office before relocating to Melbourne in 2011. “Robert is a good fit for Corrs, which is focused on developing and retaining only the highest-calibre candidates for its partnership,” crowed Corrs el supremo John Denton.

Yes, John, that might be true of Clarke, a leading M&A lawyer, but a roll call of the firm’s high-calibre partner defections in 2013 included: Andrew Pitney, the former Melbourne office head; Andrew Galvin, a leading financial services lawyer (both those gents joined HWL Ebsworth), and Jeremy Davis, one of three departing partners from Corrs to Johnson Winter & Slattery.

“JWS has much more of a transactional focus,” Davis told Lawyers Weekly in April. Ouch!

Who: Andrew Norman
Departed: King & Wood Mallesons
Joined: Clayton Utz
 

Andrew Norman is one of Melbourne’s best real estate lawyers, and he left one big firm to join another when he upped sticks from KWM in August. While this move was a good news story for Clutz, like KWM and many large firms, it had a year best forgotten. Clutz saw revenue decline by $18.7 million for FY2013, and it scaled back its recruitment numbers. KWM had redundancies and senior partner defections this year, and its merger with SJ Berwin was not exactly welcomed wholeheartedly across the full spectrum of the firm’s partnership.