Watson Burton has announced further redundancies this week. The news follows a torrid time for the Newcastle-headquartered firm, which has resulted in numerous partner defections and a rapidly falling headcount.
The four new layoffs come at a difficult time for the firm, which has only recently announced its financial results, first reported by nebusiness.co.uk. Watsons' main practice - until the work dried up - was in the controversial-yet-lucrative miner's compensation scheme and, in its 2007/08 pomp, profits hit £4.7 million on revenues of £23 million. But for 2009/10, those figures slumped to £1.8 million and £14.1 million respectively. So that's a 39% drop in turnover and a 61% drop in profits - ouch!
So, at the end of 2009, the firm's senior partners pumped £1 million into the coffers. That's an impressive £125,000 each, especially as top of equity profits fell from £700,000 to just over £200,000 between 2008 and 2009.
But it seems to have had little impact as defections continue to mount. At least ten partners have jumped ship in the past eighteen months, several twisting the knife by heading to local rival Muckle. And the 2009/10 results note that fee earner numbers dipped by a third, falling from 91 to 66 (against an overall staffing cuts from 243 to 166).
What's more, it's rumoured that trainee retention will - again - be less than impressive (although to be fair the firm has previously worked hard to find alternative jobs with neighbouring firms and clients for the NQs it couldn't retain).
A spokeswoman for the firm confirmed that four redundancies were being made but declined to comment further.
Tip Off ROF
The four new layoffs come at a difficult time for the firm, which has only recently announced its financial results, first reported by nebusiness.co.uk. Watsons' main practice - until the work dried up - was in the controversial-yet-lucrative miner's compensation scheme and, in its 2007/08 pomp, profits hit £4.7 million on revenues of £23 million. But for 2009/10, those figures slumped to £1.8 million and £14.1 million respectively. So that's a 39% drop in turnover and a 61% drop in profits - ouch!
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Watson looking worried yesterday |
So, at the end of 2009, the firm's senior partners pumped £1 million into the coffers. That's an impressive £125,000 each, especially as top of equity profits fell from £700,000 to just over £200,000 between 2008 and 2009.
But it seems to have had little impact as defections continue to mount. At least ten partners have jumped ship in the past eighteen months, several twisting the knife by heading to local rival Muckle. And the 2009/10 results note that fee earner numbers dipped by a third, falling from 91 to 66 (against an overall staffing cuts from 243 to 166).
What's more, it's rumoured that trainee retention will - again - be less than impressive (although to be fair the firm has previously worked hard to find alternative jobs with neighbouring firms and clients for the NQs it couldn't retain).
A spokeswoman for the firm confirmed that four redundancies were being made but declined to comment further.