When you walk into the offices of Newcastle law firm Muckle LLP, you can’t help but notice the considerable array of trophies.
In the last two years alone the commercial law firm has racked up 30 award wins and shortlistings, including three prizes at the 2024 Insider Dealmakers Awards, the Business of the Year trophy at our own North East Business Awards final and the North East Property Law Firm of the Year.
But the awards Muckle’s 160 staff feel particular pride over are those celebrating its commitment to staff, workplace culture and for generally being an all-round good place to work – prizes including the Best Place to Work trophy it has won two years on the trot at the North East Business Awards. Also highly valued is the Investors in People Platinum Award for its people-focused culture, and securing B Corp status which gave it a great start to 2024.
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The Best Places to Work award recognised Muckle’s commitment to developing its people through training, apprenticeships, work experience, diversity and inclusion, career progression and for opening opportunities to all through initiatives including the North East Solicitor Apprenticeship Scheme (NESA) and its mentoring scheme for working parents. The company’s commitment to being both a good employer and a responsible corporate citizen led to The Journal calling Muckle “the perennial good guys of North East business”.
Nicola Leyden, the firm’s HR director, said: “It is really like a family here – everyone helps each other out. Everybody has each other’s backs - genuinely they do. We don’t have a lot of blame here. If something doesn’t go quite right we ask what can we have done differently here?”
A great working environment comes from a firm’s people and culture, and Muckle believes that creating a workplace environment based on trust, inclusivity, and collaboration allows its people to flourish while also driving success.
So how has Muckle created its winning formula?
The successful culture started with bold ideas and changes, led by managing partner Jason Wainwright, who brought in ‘agile working’ before anyone had even heard of the word coronavirus, and a HR director who readily admits to living and breathing human psychology. Having previously built and led HR functions for tech, education and retail organisations, she said: “People say ‘You’ve worked in tech, in education, in law and in retail, they’re so different’ – but people are people. Once you understand what makes people tick then you understand how to deal with people I think.
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“I love psychology, I love business psychology – I read a lot about it generally. It just makes perfect sense to me. Whenever we are looking at our people strategies we’re always looking at it through the lens of psychology, even when we introduced agile working in 2018, before Covid.
“It was unheard of at the time for a law firm to be doing that. Jason is very much a people person and his view was that people want choice and it was an effective way to work. We ran a lot of ‘change sessions’ at the start of that, explaining how the brain works and why you might be feeling reluctant.
“We did that at the very start of this journey and it helped us to be able to have more open and collaborative conversations. Everyone is at a different place – what will work for some won’t work for others and at Muckle we don’t put people in boxes, we personalise the experience and that’s what people want. They want to feel valued and like they belong, and that you care about them as an individual.”
When Covid struck, almost all companies had to work from home - but Muckle had been doing it for two years: The company already had its BEAM team - Being Engaged at Muckle – which runs all manner of groups and activities, such as organising summer and Christmas parties, regular running and netball teams, bake offs, art competitions, so activities simply moved online to keep people connected.
Around six years ago the law firm also completely overhauled its appraisal system. Overnight, its previous performance rankings system was scrapped.
“In collaboration with colleagues, we had data findings showing that both employees hated and managers hated it,” said Nicola. “It wasn’t beneficial for anyone. People go into a traditional appraisal process and all they have in front of them is fear and noise because they’re scared of what box they’re going to be placed in. We want it to be about that individual having a great conversation.
“Now, they are asked what they’re good at, what they can get better at and asked how are they contributing to the firm in terms of what they deliver.
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“The size and the culture we’ve got allows us to have greater collaboration which means we can move at pace. And because we’ve got high levels of trust, we’ve got high levels of autonomy. And the one question we’re always asking is ‘What can we do better?’.”
Understanding what makes each member of staff tick has been an important driver at Muckle so, to that end, everyone has been through a psychological profiling exercise which identifies the “unconscious motivations” that drive a person’s behaviour and actions. Each member of staff answers a series of questions to identify their triggers, helping them to develop strategies for pressurised situations.
“Everyone in the business has been through a Print discovery session,” said Nicola, “And we then link that to different sessions - for example, team sessions where we look at your Print profiles and the profile of the whole team. How can these enhance your goals and what might get in the way? It’s really good, It’s amazing when you see people go ‘How did you know this about me?!’.”
Muckle also prides itself on the work it does within the North East community, and since 2002 its community foundation has helped over 500 charities, giving £700,000 through 700 grants, while staff have also put a lot into volunteering and pro bono work.
Nicola said Muckle is interested in collaborating with other firms around issues like volunteering – bringing people together to really make a difference – and a board has also been set up which aims to encourage greater collaboration between businesses, a move which could make all North East businesses great places to work.
Nicola is on the board of the North East Work and Talent Advisory Board, which was set in motion by Eloise Leonard-Cross and Sarah Carnegie of the CIPD North East.
She added: “We’re in the process of developing a collaboration directory, to share knowledge and experiences among businesses in the region with a view to giving people a step up - for example if I was looking for a new HR system I could go on then and ask for recommendations. That would particularly good for small businesses that haven’t got the budget or investment. It’s all about how we can help each other.”