A woman smiles while holding a paper, engaging in conversation with two people. They stand near a staircase in a modern interior with soft lighting.

Culture

Building a culture where our people can thrive

Our people are our greatest asset. They are crucial to Forsters’ success. With our team of expert lawyers and business support professionals, our goal is to provide every individual with the opportunity to thrive in their choice of career.

  • 51%

    of our Partners are female

  • 30%

    of the firm are signed up to our Wellbeing Fund

  • 300+

    Knowledge and L&D workshops, lectures
    and seminars

All data FY23/24

Creating an inclusive culture

Our aim is to support and encourage diversity within our workforce and to make Forsters a truly inclusive place to work. We strive to improve understanding and communication, break down barriers and encourage and embrace people’s differences so that every individual can flourish.

Our Diversity and Inclusion Committee actively promotes and drives action across the firm, and we have seven employee-led support networks covering disability, faith, gender equality, pride, race, social mobility, and working parents and carers. These networks offer a space for discussion, raising awareness and influencing change through firmwide collaboration.

Our Diversity and Inclusion Strategy supports the firm’s growth and business priorities. Having a diverse and inclusive workforce will mean we are better able to respond to challenges and meet the needs of our clients. We know that attracting and retaining staff is absolutely linked to our culture and how happy and supported people feel at work. We want to ensure that everyone at Forsters feels valued and included.

Hear from our team

Former Senior Partner Smita Edwards, Graduate Recruitment Partner Emily Holdstock and Graduate Recruitment officer Emma Cooper join Miri Stickland to discuss why diversity and inclusion is so important to Forsters, the preconceptions that applicants may have about the firm and why they should look past them, and initiatives the Graduate Recruitment team are taking to promote diversity.

Listen to the podcast

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The Halo Code

Forsters champions the right of staff to embrace all Afro-hairstyles. We acknowledge that Afro-textured hair is an important part of our Black employees’ racial, ethnic, cultural, and religious identities, and requires specific styling for hair health and maintenance.

We celebrate Afro-textured hair worn in all styles including, but not limited to, afros, locs, twists, braids, cornrows, fades, hair straightened through the application of heat or chemicals, weaves, wigs, headscarves, and wraps.

At Forsters, we recognise and celebrate our colleagues’ identities. We are a community built on an ethos of equality and respect where hair texture and style have no bearing on an employee’s ability to succeed.

Learn more about the Halo Collective
Memberships and partnerships
The image shows the text "BRIGHT NETWORK" in bold capital letters. "BRIGHT" is in orange and "NETWORK" in black, centred on a plain white background.
Logo featuring interlocking circular shapes on the left and the text "Business Disability Forum" on the right, with "Business" and "Forum" in grey, and "Disability" in blue.
Disability confident Committed logo
The logo features four icons representing disabilities: a brain, eye with slash, ear, and a wheelchair user. Below, the text reads "Disabilityjob.co.uk" in blue and grey lettering.
The word "HALO" is depicted with a sunburst design radiating from the letter "O", suggesting brightness or illumination. The text is styled in a bold serif font.
The text "MyPLUS" is displayed in bold letters, with "My" in black and "PLUS" in green; a small grey plus sign appears next to "PLUS". The background is white.

Facilitating professional development

At Forsters, we support every person to achieve and this includes facilitating everyone with their professional growth and development.

Our Learning and Development (L&D) team offers a comprehensive suite of opportunities for business skills enhancement across a range of topics to facilitate the exchange of knowledge, ideas and perspectives. We offer professional development at career transition points, for example for new trainees and those who have been promoted to Partner or Counsel. Our internal and external coaching capability also provides focused development in a one-to-one setting to work on business objectives and professional growth.

Our Knowledge team assists with improving the internal management and dissemination of knowledge and information at Forsters. Innovative legal technology is a key focus and vital in improving efficiency and managing risk alongside leveraging knowledge to champion our business reputation as experts in our fields.

Our interactive style of skills development fosters an environment that supports and encourages continuous professional growth through research-led tools, sharing ideas and learning from others.

Sharon TattanHead of Learning and Development

Championing wellbeing

We are committed to promoting and protecting the health, safety and welfare of all our people. We want every person at Forsters to have a positive lived day-to-day working experience, with all of us being empowered to manage our wellbeing.

Wellbeing is integral to our distinctively friendly and supportive culture. Working in the legal sector can be hugely rewarding but it can also be demanding. When our people are healthy they are motivated and this will have a positive impact on the effectiveness of our business.

We have a strong firmwide programme of wellbeing-related events, communications, benefits and tools to help when our people need support for their mental, physical and financial wellbeing.

 

We are delighted to have retained our Gold award status in the MIND Workplace Wellbeing Index in 2023-24. The Gold award is for employers who have embedded mental health into their policies and practices demonstrating a long-term and in-depth commitment to staff mental health.

A blue badge with a pink scalloped border features the text: "Achieving Excellence, Workplace Wellbeing Index 2023/24, Gold." At the bottom, a logo reads "Mind" in blue.

legal cheek

In the Legal Cheek Trainee and Junior Lawyer Survey 2023-24, we scored A* on work/life balance, work from home and peer support.

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Connecting for positive impact

To read more about our wellbeing initiatives please read our Responsible business review 2023-24

Read the review

Responsible business impact report 2023 - 24

Our values

Our commitment to D&I, professional development and wellbeing is absolutely essential to our success in living out our values on a daily basis and to achieving our business objectives.

  •  

    We collaborate
    for excellence

  •  

    We are
    driven by
    what really
    matters

  •  

    We support every person to achieve

  •  

    We take happiness seriously

Our values are at the heart of everything we do

Our values drive everything we do at Forsters. They reflect our ambition to make a difference to the people we work with and the clients we represent.

  • We collaborate for excellence

  • We are
    driven by
    what really
    matters

  • We support every person
    to achieve

  • We take happiness seriously

Leading the way

Amy France
Amy France

Partner, Commercial Real Estate | Diversity
Inclusion Committee co-lead

A person is smiling, wearing glasses and a suit with a light pink shirt, against a blurred background with a vertically textured pattern.
Charles Miéville

Partner, Residential Property | Diversity
and Inclusion Committee co-lead