UK corporate law firms hire mostly men for highest-paid roles

Women still account for a small minority of senior dealmaking hires into UK law firms, according to new data, underlining how the most lucrative roles remain dominated by men despite an uptick in diversity across the sector.

Men made up 80 per cent of partners hired into corporate and finance practices — often the highest-billing departments in commercial law firms — between 2019 and 2024, according to data from legal recruiter Edwards Gibson.

At most, women made up about a quarter of such hires in any single year in that period, and in 2021 accounted for as few as 11 per cent.

The figures indicate that improvements in the hiring and retention of female partners at the UK’s top international law firms have failed to make a dent in the most competitive areas of corporate law.

The small proportion of women in dealmaking hires stands in contrast to the wider sector, where female partners have consistently made up about 29 per cent of total hires each year since 2019, according to Edwards Gibson. The headhunter said hires in areas such as employment, pensions and private client were closer to gender parity.

That echoes improvements in gender balances across law firms in recent years, with several top UK-based firms, including Linklaters and Freshfields, now led by women. Women made up 37 per cent of partners in 2023, an increase of 5 percentage points on 2015, according to the most recent data from the Solicitors Regulation Authority, which covers lawyers in England and Wales.

However, areas such as finance and private equity, known for having long and unpredictable working hours, remain less equal. In a report last month, legal recruiter Macrae found that only 15 per cent of partner hires in private equity in London between 2020 and May 2025 were women.

Bar chart of Women are underrepresented in the corporate and finance transfer market showing Men dominate top-billing practice areas

Lesley Gregory, a corporate partner at Haynes Boone, said caring responsibilities could act as barriers to women in building a book of business, making them in some cases less likely to apply for and be recruited into senior deals-focused roles.

“There are fewer networking opportunities for women at hours that suit their primary carer responsibilities or events which feel inclusive and welcoming,” said Gregory.

One senior corporate partner at a top firm in the UK agreed that lifestyle factors remained the most significant factor holding women back. “Transactional-focused practices like corporate and private equity are the least suited to people who want to have any kind of ordered life,” they said. “The ultimate result is fewer women in the pool and therefore in the transfer market.”

However, Scott Gibson, founding partner of Edwards Gibson, said a key factor was that men were more likely to inflate their potential book of business to a prospective firm, whereas women were more likely to understate it.

“Men tend to be far more optimistic about the size of their client followings — this is both an emollient for the hire itself, and it often results in them achieving higher compensation,” said Gibson. “As a general rule, we multiply a man’s business case by 0.8 and a woman’s by 1.2.”

A number of senior partners at large firms told the Financial Times that they applied a similar approach to hiring partners from other firms.