Ashurst has announced collaborations with leading law companies Cognia Law and Elevate to offer a new flexible resourcing platform as part of its Ashurst Advance capability.

UK and Australia

The Ashurst Advance Reach platform aims to enable the firm to source contract lawyers who can be engaged to supplement Ashurst's practice areas as well as allowing clients to access technical expertise for secondments. The service will be offered initially in the UK and Australia and, over time, will be developed into a platform for the firm's global network of offices. The firm says this latest move reinforces Ashurst’s commitment to being a leader and innovator in the legal services market, strengthens and integrates client service and transforms the firm’s resourcing model. Ashurst Advance Reach will be led by Alexa Crawford as senior operations manager and will form part of the alternative resourcing arm of Ashurst Advance, led by Iain Brown, head of alternative resourcing in Ashurst Advance Delivery. Mr Brown commented, “By giving our practice groups access to high quality lawyers on a flexible basis we can source required skills on demand and maintain a productive, lean business model without sacrificing our ability to respond to spikes in demand from our clients, at the same time as maintaining the wellbeing of our lawyers when workload increases.”

Leading disruptors

The service aims to build on the vision of Ashurst Advance to be the leading new law partner to the firm's clients, including through innovative partnerships with leading disruptors in the legal services market. The collaboration with Elevate, which specialises in the flexible resourcing space, is new for Ashurst and will help the firm moves towards developing a global flexible resourcing service.  The partnership with Cognia Law builds on the firm's existing collaboration in the managed legal services space extending the relationship to include access to Cognia Law’s managed flex resourcing platform and top quality pool of legal practitioners in the UK and Europe. Mr Brown explained, “We see collaborations between law firms and innovative legal service providers like Cognia Law and Elevate as strategically important in creating value for our clients across a broader spectrum of their legal needs and we believe such collaborations will increasingly define the future of the legal market.” Janet Taylor-Hall, ceo of Cognia Law, said “The ability to provide innovative, flexible approaches to staffing is a crucial component in supporting clients as they shape and build the workforce of the future.” Janvi Patel, vp of Elevated Lawyers, added, “There is a growing demand for the flexible sourcing model worldwide.”