There’s A New Legal Recruitment App In Town & It’s About To Change Everything

If the press reports are anything to go by this piece of disruptive technology may change the way legal recruitment is processed both by firms and applicants.

We’d suggest that Route one combined with new legal AI technologies may well be the death knell for legal recruiters of old

This is what BNA are saying….we note that there are a lot of people from the established end of town acting as naysayers but generational change will also mean that people will just look at recruiting in a different way

To be honest the , it won’t work for partner recruitment  argument, is we believe dead in the water. Law firms are changing and money is harder to come by. If partnerships see a way of saving money and especially in recruitment they will we can assure you adopt the new solution. It has always been the case and always will be the case.

Newer legal markets like Asia love this sort of technology and in the USA there’s a quiet growth of SME boutique firms  across multiple states in tech, cannabis and similar industries and we suggest this tool will be a perfect way for them to access applicants nationwide.

 

Will This App Disrupt the Legal Headhunting World?

A new app has emerged that aims to make it easier for lawyers to look for new jobs. (As if the legal industry needed something else to speed up the revolving door, amirite?) But how much will it penetrate the market?

Route1, an app that allows lawyers to search and apply for jobs by matching them with well-suited positions, started its roll-out in Australia last week and has been making a mini-roadshow of sorts, appearing in The Australian Financial Review.

“It’s for busy lawyers who have got a ton on their plate,” Route1 Australian general manager Paul Simos told Misa Han of AFR. He said the app would forego the traditional recruiting process that includes vetting and interviews, and cut to the chase, allowing employers to view user applications via the app.

What’s more is that the app is cheap and only takes a five percent commission on the candidate’s first-year salary, compared to a 20 to 25 percent commission for traditional legal recruiters, according to the article.

It’s drawn the attention of some big law firms, bringing users like Norton Rose Fulbright, Ashurst, Corrs Chambers Westgarth and Gilbert + Tobin. AFR called it a “Tinder-style app.”

We reached out to Route1 for comment, and haven’t yet heard back. But we did check in with a handful of U.S.-based recruiters. Not surprisingly, they shrugged off the product and said that it would most likely be used for associate placements, not partner.

Said Renee Rush, a legal recruiter in New York: “I don’t believe that the app will effect high-end associate or partner hiring for two reasons: One is that, many of the associates and partners we work with are not actively looking and we reach out to them with specific opportunities, or they are specifically referred to us for guidance in the process. Second, part of our value is evaluating the individual lawyer and then identifying the best firm for that lawyer based on our knowledge of both the client and lawyer. It is not simply an algorithm. It is a process which we have learned through years of involvement in this industry and taking the time to really know our clients.”

Sabina Lippman in Los Angeles: “The start-up will be targeting the recruitment of senior associates and in-house counsel because there is high demand for these roles. It does not do partner recruitment, which is usually a much more involved process.”

Larry Watanabe in San Diego: “There have been literally hundreds+ of on-line attempts to recruit associates and bypass headhunters. Some were initiated well over 20 years ago. The fact is at least in the U.S., high level lawyers are not going to use an app or website and self-submit. At the upper end of the market, headhunters will continue to exist because the human contact and related touch points are important to both the candidates and law firms.”

So keep that in mind — if you ever get replaced by a computer, you can always try for a fresh start as a high-end legal recruiter.

Will This App Disrupt the Legal Headhunting World?