Clarke Willmott partner Graham McIntyre talks to Legal Week Intelligence.

How would you define the culture? In one word: friendly. Open, honest and hard working. For relationships to prosper, essentially there needs to be a commonality of interest and hard work – but balanced hard work. I have a 10-year-old and a 12-year-old; that's my other full-time job. One of my goals each day is to get home at an hour that means I can actually spend some time with them. I accept the nature of my job is there are times when that doesn't work out terrifically well, but it's the balance over the course of a year that is important.

What has been your greatest achievement in the last year? Geographical expansion is very much part of our growth strategy. During the past year, we have seen growth in all our offices, including our new team in Cardiff who opened their doors in April 2015. Another highlight for us has been the 100% trainee retention rate we have achieved in the past 12 months.

What is your greatest challenge? Keeping up with agile working and maintaining excellent client service. It encompasses an entire piece about mobile working, mobile technology and ensuring that supervision is maintained if people are working remotely. It comes down to making sure we have things like the proper mobile technology so that people can login remotely, files being accessible online, and that there is frequent communication by telephone rather than just by email. Of course, there is no substitute for face-to-face interaction, which remains a key building block for growing our teams and culture.

Top three BER scores – Clarke Willmott

• Quality of work
• Reputation of practice area/team
• Quality of clients

Clarke Willmott BER comments – What do you like best about your firm?

• 'The perks – an allocated budget each year for social events for each office, parking, sponsorship for legal qualifications, corporate memberships for gyms, etc and lots more!'
• 'There is a real team spirit around the office'
• 'It promotes a happy, flexible and supportive environment and encourages progression'

For more information on the Best Employers Report 2016, email [email protected] or call her on +44 (0)207 316 9864    .