Norton Rose has made a double management hire to fill two new roles of group chief information officer and group director of knowledge management.

The UK top 10 firm has recruited former Royal Mail IT director Sheila Doyle for the information officer role and Clifford Chance (CC) director of global knowledge systems Sam Dimond as knowledge management chief.

Norton Rose said the newly-created positions have been instated to enable the expanding group to follow best practice for IT and knowledge management at a global level. Norton Rose is due to merge with Canada's Ogilvy Renault and South African firm Deneys Reitz as of 1 June, after entering into the Australian market with last year's Deacons merger.

Norton Rose group chief executive Peter Martyr said: "As of 1 June, we will be amongst the ten biggest legal practices in the world. Bringing Sheila and Sam on board will help ensure our know-how is employed to the best effect across the group, and our approach to IT remains at the cutting edge of our industry. Both are vital in ensuring our clients can properly benefit from our growth."

Doyle added: "The legal industry has seen a great deal of development in recent years when it comes to IT. Norton Rose has often been at the forefront of many of those improvements, and so it is a very exciting organisation to be joining."

Doyle joined Norton Rose yesterday (9 May) and Dimond will join on 15 August. Doyle was Royal Mail's IT director until last year and previously held senior roles at IBM and BP.

Dimond, who has worked at CC for 13 years, also trained there as a solicitor and was an associate in the magic circle firm's tax practice until 2001.