Specialist Advisor to our Legal Practice – Julia Chain has over 20 years experience of legal and management roles in both private practice and industry. She began her career as a corporate finance lawyer at Shearman and Sterling, New York. On returning to the UK, she qualified as a solicitor at Herbert Smith spending the next few years specialising in mergers and acquisitions. In 1993 Julia joined Garretts, the law firm associated with Andersen’s, as one of three partners, becoming managing partner in 1994, the first woman managing partner in the UK of a top 100 law firm. Julia oversaw the growth of Garretts from a small niche practice of four lawyers to a major corporate law firm of over 300 lawyers in just over 5 years. In 1998 she joined the board of T-Mobile UK as General Counsel and spent six years there building up from scratch one of the UK’s top in-house legal departments which now comprises 20 or so lawyers and 40 other staff involved in related disciplines such as regulatory, health and safety, risk and business continuity. Julia is a Commissioner for the Commission for Racial Equality and chair of its Legal Committee and is a member of the academic council of BPP Professional Education Plc, the UK’s leading professional services training organisation. Julia was recently voted as one of the top 50 most influential women in Law by Legal Business magazine.
