According to respondents to the recent job satisfaction survey at Ashurst, areas for improvement at the City leader include internal communication and the use of technology.

However, one former employee of the firm alerted The Diary to another battleground that has recently opened up in the constant struggle – common to all large organisations – between rank and file and senior management.

You guessed it – spoons. It seems the humble plastic tea spoons on offer to staff (as seen in motorway service stations up and down the nation) have been deemed too much of a drain on firm resources – and have been replaced with wooden sticks.

While the Starbucks-style stick might be adequate for stirring a coffee or perhaps even the occasional hot chocolate, harpooning a troublesome teabag is less easily mastered by time-conscious support staff.

It is certainly a far cry from the personalised napkin holders that, until recently, were standard issue for partners at fellow top City outfit Slaughter and May.

Expect 'repeated scalding resulting from unwieldy beverage stirrers' to feature in next year's satisfaction survey as a growing area of concern.