Meet Our Team

Paul Wilkinson

Managing Director

Lawclient Ltd

Paul is the Managing Director and technical lead being the founder and owner Lawclient Ltd and Digital Compliance Ltd.

A graduate in Applied Physics, with over 25 years experience in several technology based companies, Paul has had board-level experience in a number of IPO’s and an LSE listed company.

For the past 14 years Paul has been at the forefront of compliance in providing both software solutions and bespoke consultancy services to law firms in Regulatory Affairs, Quality Standards compliance and Practice management.

Paul is an accredited mediator for both Civil and Commercial dispute resolution with ADR Group.

Paul manages Compliance with SRA Solicitors’ Code of Conduct and SRA Accounts Rules, LeO Complaints handling, Legal Aid High Cost cases , VHCC and Civil Costs.

In addition he lectures on The Bribery Act, Anti-Money Laundering procedures, Risk Management and Regulatory Affairs including SAR and SRA matters with the Middlesex Law Society and provides SRA accredited in-house training with Compliance Check.

Specialities:

• Business and Risk management;
• The Bribery Act; AML;
• Compliance including responsibilities of both COLP and COFA;
• High Cost Case management with LSC Special Case Unit (SCU);
• Costs Appeals and Bills of Costs;
• Litigation, Family and Conveyancing;
• Civil and Commercial Mediation;
• Practice Management;
• Quality Management with CQS, SQM and Lexcel Accreditation.

Stephen Walker

Accredited Mediator with ADRg

Solicitor

Stephen has mediated over 200 mediations and disputes including professional negligence, racial discrimination, finances, landlord & tenant, construction, trusts, personal injury, property, boundary, family, inheritance and probate, supply contracts, agency and franchise agreements, partnership, directors’ break-ups and shareholders rights and employment.

Stephen encourages parties to:

• Price the risk of not settling and doing better at trial;
• See how the gap can be bridged
• Concentrate on the problem-solving part of the mediation day, rather than on the advocacy and point-scoring part.

Areas of Practice:

General Commercial, Contract, Financial Services/Insurance/Reinsurance Professional Negligence: Solicitors, barristers, architects, surveyors, accountants, financial advisors, auctioneers, insurance brokers. Disputes between Shareholders/Directors/Partners/Trustees, Employment, Internet and e-commerce, Art Law, Insolvency, Contentious Probate.

Fiona Green

Fiona qualified as a Solicitor in 2001 and is an experienced Civil Litigator , in personal injury, consumer and contractual disputes and debt recovery. She has recently worked for a Human Rights Charity. Fiona became an accredited mediator in 2008 and is trained in commercial, workplace and community mediation. She enjoys training in Equality and Diversity and Mediation and has a keen interest in community work and promoting mediation to the wider population.

Robert Pearson

Partner, Compliance Check at Curwens LLP;

Consultant, Risk and Compliance Service at The Law Society of England and Wales;

Legal Risk and Compliance Training and Systems at Compliance Consultancy for Lawyers.

Rob is a Risk and Compliance Consultant for law firms, having extensive management experience within his firm as a Managing Partner for 10 years, up to May 2008. Rob remains the firm's Compliance Partner. After working for the Law Society as a Consultant in 2009/10, providing client care training and support, Rob established his own independent business, Compliance Consultancy for Solicitors. Arising from such, Curwens has instrumentally developed its own Risk and Compliance brand, Compliance Check. Additionally, Rob is now the Law Society’s Compliance Officer for Legal Practice (COLP).

Rob is an experienced Civil Litigation solicitor, specialising mainly in Property Litigation, predominantly boundaries and adverse possession; landlord and tenant litigation; professional negligence against lawyers; and costs issues against lawyers.

Rob also assists other law firms as one of the Law Society Panel Consultants in the recently-launched Risk and Compliance Service.

Rob has an influential role within Lawclient’s Compliance team collaborating with Paul Wilkinson to host Compliance workshops to benefit law firm managers, directors and partners and anyone who requires a detailed understanding of the new regulations.

Jane Blackstock

Jane Blackstock is accredited by the Law Society of England & Wales as a Lexcel Assessor and Consultant. Jane has extensive experience in working with law firms of all sizes in order to ensure that they meet the Lexcel requirements first time and every time. As Lexcel Development Manager for the West Midlands, she trained and quality assured the work of Lexcel Consultants and Assessors, verifying that they were delivering quality outcomes. Jane has contributed to the Law Society “Lexcel Link” magazine and continues to deliver bespoke training to firms nationally in respect of all aspects of Lexcel compliance and OFR.  Jane believes that it is of utmost importance that projects she undertakes are constantly being driven towards completion within a set timeline, budget and resources.

Jane is an experienced HR Consultant, in particular delivering training and providing advice in respect of the People Management requirements that are integral to both SQM and Lexcel. She is an accredited SQM assessor and consultant, working extensively with clients in respect of the provisions of the SQM standard and conducting SQM Audits on behalf of the SQM Delivery Partnership.

Rebecca Curran

Rebecca Curran is a non-practising solicitor and Lexcel Assessor and Consultant. Rebecca worked at the Law Society and the SRA for over five years and has co-ordinated and managed the delivery of hundreds of monitoring visits to law firms. During her time with the SRA, she held a technical advisory post, giving technical advice and guidance to other staff within the Practice Standards Unit. Rebecca was also a significant contributor to “Your Clients – Your Business” - client care guidance published by Professional Ethics. She has written and delivered lecture materials for client care seminars given by Law Society staff throughout England and Wales.

Rebecca’s experience in private practice means that she is fully equipped to recognise and deal with the challenges faced by law firms and she can give practical and meaningful advice and support. She has also given numerous lectures on behalf of CLT and local Law Societies, including lectures on OFR and the new Code of Conduct, complaints handling, file auditing and client care. Rebecca is an accredited SQM assessor and consultant. She trains regularly on the provisions of the SQM standard on behalf of the SQM Delivery Partnership. Rebecca also lectures and trains regularly on Lexcel, most recently, on the new requirements of Version 5 and has completed her Law Society CQS Assessor training.

Elaine Robinson

Elaine Robinson is a non-practising solicitor, admitted in 1991, and a Lexcel Consultant. She practised as a solicitor until 2003 and also carried out Peer Review for the Legal Services Commission for a number of years.

Elaine joined the Practice Standards Unit of the Law Society, later to become the SRA, in 2003 and has carried out in the region of 300 monitoring visits to firms since then, giving wide experience of the challenges faced by firms of all sizes and areas of practice.

In March 2011, Elaine moved to the SRA’s new Supervision directorate on a six-month secondment, in order to participate in the Supervision pilot, developing the approach and methodology to be adopted by the SRA in engaging with firms under OFR and the new Code of Conduct from October 2011. This has given her invaluable insight in to the SRA’s new approach to regulation and the regulated community, which will inform the advice and approach of Quality & Compliance Legal.

Elaine left the SRA and joined Quality & Compliance Legal in November 2011. In addition to being a Lexcel Consultant, she is an accredited SQM Auditor and consultant.

Gill Peach

Gill Peach has over 20 years practical experience of compliance, risk management, regulation, client care, quality standards (Lexcel, CQS, SQM, ISO9001 and ISO14001).   She has delivered presentations and published articles and is a registered Law Society Lexcel Consultant.

Whilst Quality Manager at Pannone LLP, Gill was instrumental in the firm achieving compliance with ISO9001, Lexcel, SQM and Investor in People and was responsible for managing and maintaining compliance.  Just before moving on from Pannone, Gill took the firm to first stage assessment against ISO 14001 Environmental Management Standard.  

Within her role at Pannone, Gill provided Lexcel consultancy advice for Connect2Law member firms, assisted with accreditation, and worked with Connect2Law and the Law Society to promote Lexcel.  She also achieved Pannone's shortlisting for the Law Society Excellence Awards.

Gill has broad practice management experience and a wide experience of the accreditation process, auditing, identifying and implementing improvements, delivering training, hosting external audits and liaising with accreditation bodies.

In addition, Gill was shortlisted for the Law Society Lexcel Panel, presented on Lexcel/practice management on behalf of the Law Society International Division to a delegation of Nigerian lawyers, and presented to Claims Direct Panel members on quality standards and risk management.

Gill set up Gill Peach Quality Consultancy in March 2011 and provides consultancy to the legal profession.  In addition, she works in Risk & Compliance at Russell Jones & Walker, part of Slater & Gordon Lawyers.

Tim Prior

Tim Prior has over 20 years experience of professional negligence, professional indemnity insurance, operational risk management (as it affects law firms and other professionals) and training for law firms and other professionals. Tim is a contributing author to LexisPSL on risk and compliance issues and is a regular speaker at Law Society and CLT events. He is a member of the Law Society's Conveyancing Quality Scheme Assessment Panel and is risk consultant to the scheme. Tim was admitted as a solicitor in 1986 and has specialised in negligence and compliance issues since the late 1980s. The early 90s saw him training claims handlers at the compulsory mutual insurer the Solicitors Indemnity Fund on the avalanche of lenders’ claims that ultimately proved SIF’s downfall.

In recent years he has worked predominantly with international law firms and other top 100 firms but has also worked with smaller niche firms, advising on their negligence claims and other risk and compliance issues, sharing the benefit of his experience through seminars and workshops.

He is accredited by the Law Society of England & Wales as a Lexcel consultant. He still holds a Practising Certificate but is technically a non-practising solicitor as PNCR Legal is not a law firm.

Tim is a Fellow of the Institute of Risk Management and chairman of its Legal Risk Special Interest Group which holds meetings and seminars on topical issues.

Over the years he has worked with regulators and representative bodies and has worked with training organisations such as the College of Law and CLT. A regular speaker at both national and local Law Society events and at CLT conferences, he has also contributed to many LNTV training programmes.

Bogac Ozgen

Founder at GyroFalco Ltd.

Bogac is a Management consultant, auditor and trainer with extensive international and cross-sectoral experience. He defines his ultimate goal as helping his clients understand what they desire to achieve and support them to reach their goals. He enables his clients to analyse and audit processes and identify areas for improvement. He leads them to plan and take actions to achieve improvement and innovation.
Bogac has an academic background as an Industrial Engineer with a Masters degree in Engineering Management.

Bogac provides consultancy, auditing and training services for ISO27001 Information Security Management Systems, ISO20000 IT Service Management Systems, BS 25999 & ISO 22301 Business Continuity Management Systems, ISO9001 Quality Management Systems, TickIT and TickITPlus schemes and Enterprise Risk Management. He has experience in over 20 industries in more than 20 countries in Europe. The industries that his clients perform include Legal Services, Consultancy, Telecom, IT Services, Technology, Finance, Gambling, Government, Healthcare, Logistics, Media & Marketing, Security, Software development and Call Centres. He has worked with over 300 organizations in Europe and personally interviewed more than 4000 people at different organizational levels and business functions from Board to shop level.

Services include :
-Business Intelligence
-Governance
-Interested Parties relationship management
-Operational Strategy
-Performance Management
-Process Management
-Resource Management

Bogac is also passionate about playing classical guitar and teaching tango.

Linkedin Profile: http://www.linkedin.com/pub/bogac-ozgen/3/772/508

www.GyroFalco.com

Evrim Numanoglu Ozgen

MD at GyroFalco Ltd.

Evrim is Managing Director of GyroFalco Ltd providing management consultancy, auditing and training services. She is also a co-founder of a new venture developing Technology solutions for Enterprise Risk Management. She specializes in General Management, Business Development and Operational Strategy and has a diverse and wide international network from corporate, entrepreneurial and academic worlds.

Prior to GyroFalco Ltd, Evrim worked at the British Standards Institute (BSI), where she was Head of Customer Services in EMEA Region and managed international customers like Alcoa, Johnson & Johnson, Unisys, Accenture and Ricoh.  She managed and worked with multi-cultural teams in Europe, Asia, America and Middle East in her entire career. She has Lead Auditor qualifications for Information Security, Business Continuity, Quality Management and Social Accountability Management Systems.

Evrim holds a degree in Industrial Engineering and an MBA from London Business School.

She is a Sports Massage Therapist, a tango teacher and a sports addict.

Specialties: 

- Management Systems

- Information Security Management Systems (ISO 27001), Quality Management System (ISO 9001), Social Accountability (SA 8000), Business Continuity ( BS 25999, ISO 22301)

- Enterprise Risk Management

- Key Account Management

- Customer Relations Management 

- Business Development

- Business & Process Improvement

Linkedin Profile: http://www.linkedin.com/pub/evrim-numanoglu-ozgen-mba/a/92b/779

www.GyroFalco.com

Martin Langan

Solicitor and Legal IT Consultant

He has developed workflows for Residential Conveyancing, Probate, Personal Injury, Family and Debt Recovery, all adapting and building upon out of the box case management packages provided by legal software suppliers. And case management applications afresh for Civil Litigation, Crime, Employment, Wills, EPAs, LPAs, Declarations of Trust and Commercial Property.

We are constantly creating new workflows and evolving existing ones to equip firms with the maximum in efficiency. All case management applications can be tailored to your firm's precise needs and style.

Martin has written a series of articles in The Law Society Gazette.

Peter Blair

Director at Mar-aon Consulting

Peter is a business consultant with over twenty years’ experience of working with legal organisations. He specialises in strategic planning, executive coaching, financial understanding and operational contingency planning.

Formerly the Deputy Chief Executive and Director of Finance at The Honourable Society of the Middle Temple, Peter was asked to become the first Chief Operating Officer at Field Fisher Waterhouse LLP. Since leaving FFW in 2009, Peter has consulted to law firms, sets of chambers and to other organisations in general management and leadership skills. He has recently completed successful projects in re-financing, strategic understanding, pre and post merger strategy and staff structure in the UK and in Europe.

He has been the interim CEO for a number of organisations including an educational consultant and a criminal set of chambers in London. Peter has delivered lectures for Law Societies in England and Wales and is the author of “Law Firm Governance and Measurements of Success”, published in 2011. He is the Chairman of the Trust for Sustainable Living, a charity based outside Newbury and The Living Rainforest.

He has an MBA from London Business School.

Mar-aon Consulting

Kim Hobbs

Practice Director at GT Stewart Solicitors

Kim was appointed Practice Director for GT Stewart in November 2012. Previously he held the role of Practice Manager at Curwens LLP since 2007 and before that, he was with a smaller five-partner practice on the other side of Hertfordshire for more than 4 years.  Whilst at Curwens, Kim  developed systems and processes enabling the firm to win Lexcel accreditation and subsequently led successful annual audits until his departure. Part of this journey required the firm to make significant structural changes including the appointment of a Management Board, of which Kim was a part.  Kim is experienced in drafting manuals and office procedures and in training staff to meet the latest SRA and Lexcel standards.

Until his new appointment Kim worked closely with Rob Pearson as an integral part of Compliance Check – Curwens’ risk and compliance advisory service to other law firms.  

Kim previously worked as Practice Manager for a charity fund raising consultancy and in a general management role for a West End brand agency specialising in retail parks. He has business management experience in commerce as well as his more recent appointments in the legal sector. He is trained as a Health and Safety Advisor, having gained the NEBOSH Diploma Pt I. Whilst this is not presently part of Compliance Check’s portfolio of services, the risk assessment discipline now required for law firm compliance, is a familiar skill.

Iain Goldrein QC

Barrister

Deputy High Court Judge

Accredited Mediator

Iain Goldrein’s unique inter-disciplinary experience affords him the opportunity for imaginative case analysis to achieve creativity in advocacy and dispute resolution. Iain has extensive practical experience of crime, civil and family work [appearing throughout England and Wales and up to the Privy Council (test point of law from Brunei) and House of Lords]:

• Crime
• Family
• Civil
• Commercial

Accredited Mediator in Commerce and Family matters:

• Accredited by the Academy of Experts [1991] and the ADR Group [2009 and 2010];
• Assistance with a leading book on mediation published in HK [“The Hong Mediation Handbook” 2010] is expressly acknowledged in that work by the Editor;
• Member of the Civil Mediation Council and the Association of Northern Mediators;
• Attracted powerful praise for mediation performance;
• He also runs a co-mediation service with Mark Mattison.

His professional experience affords him skills to mediate in a wide range of disputes including commercial, family, privacy and the media, insurance, genetics related issues, pharmaceutical product liability, employment, solicitor’s and professional negligence, medical disputes including health trusts and clinical negligence, personal injury, human rights, administrative law matters and engineering issues.

Alberta Tevie

Accredited Member of the Law Society Children Panel, the Law Society Family Panel and Resolution and First for Family Law

Alberta qualified as a Barrister in 1984 and later converted to become a Solicitor. She has always specialised in Family, Social Services and Education Law. She also acts as a freelance trainer and consultant to both private clients and public authorities.

One of Alberta's areas of specialisation is Sharia Law. In this area of work she also acts as a consultant to both individuals private and public organisations, in particular those seeking an Islamic solution that is compatible with English law.

Areas of Practice

Divorce, Ancillary Relief, Children- Private Law, Children- Public Law, Child Abduction, Grand Parents Rights, Sharia Law, Adoption, Alimony & Spousal Support, Children’s' Rights, Custody & Visitation, Domestic Violence & Neglect, Paternity, Prenuptial Agreements, Special Education.

Michael Nelson

Barrister at 7 Bell Yard

A leading defence Counsel on the South-East and Midlands circuits frequently dealing with lengthy fraud and corruption in public office matters. He has significant experience in dealing with major crime and was the Leading Junior in what it considered to have been the largest ever internet fraud investigated by the Economic Crime Unit of the Metropolitan Police. This case, R v Kostap, targeted both major banks and individuals of some £100 million. Other notable fraud work has covered the insurance and construction industries. Michael has delivered lectures and seminars to various professional bodies and is so well regarded as a trainer that he is one of the Advocacy Tutors for The Honorable Society of Lincolns' Inn.

Recently Michael Nelson has been appointed a UK assessor to Transparency International. As such he attended the joint UN and EU roundtable table at the European Parliament in Brussels on the UN Convention against corruption (UNCAC).

Transparency International ( Ti ) is the global civil society NGO leading the fight against corruption. Their work through the 90 worldwide chapters is recognised by the major supranational bodies and organistaions ( UN, EU World Bank and so forth ) as the superlative resource in definition and depth.

Dr Brian Steels

Advisor

Dr Brian Steels is a Visiting Lecturer at the Crime Research Centre, UWA lecturing in Restorative Justice to Masters of Criminal Justice, as well as a Lecturer and Honorary Fellow at the Law School, Murdoch. Dr. Steels is also a Research Fellow at Curtin University at their Centre for Aboriginal Studies. He is an International Facilitator and Trainer of RJ Practices and has conducted research as well as National and International Workshops. He is the International Representative for Justicia Restaurativa Y Mediacion Penal, Espanola, Coordinates the Asia Pacific Forum for Restorative Justice and leads the Institute for Restorative Justice & Penal Reform in Australia.

His work among Aboriginal Communities as a researcher and counsellor is well documented as is his special interest in Indigenous peoples throughout the region including Japan, Taiwan, China and more locally Australia, where his involvement in sentencing circles, family conferencing and healing ceremonies is well recognised among local people and his peers. His work for Penal Reform as a Critical Criminologist as well as an activist sets him apart from his peers as he sits among the world's foremost Convict Criminologists. His book 'Declared Guilty: The Never Ending Story' shows his talent, experience and academic rigour that provides us all with an insight into the penal estate that is often censored by media and departments alike.

Raymond D Smith

Director of Learning

Raymond is the Director of  Learning with Lawclient Telepresence Ltd and the key strategist for our learning systems development.

Smith is also the Associate Dean of Executive Education at the Darla Moore School of Business, University of South Carolina, and he is the designer of the new Multi-Modal Learning System, which leverages new communication technologies to enable people from across the globe to engage in Executive Education programs in interesting and dynamic learning environments while spending less time away from their workplace.

Smith is the former Associate Dean of Executive Education at the Darla Moore School of Business, University of South Carolina, and the designer of a new Multi-Modal Learning System, which leverages new communication technologies to enable people from across the globe to engage in Executive Education programs in interesting and dynamic learning environments while spending less time away from their workplace.

Smith has designed and developed the concept of the virtual global classroom that utilizes the latest multimedia, telepresence, webex, iPhone and iPad technologies, enabling trainers and staff in remote locations to learn together anywhere in the world.

Raymond has formed a strategic relationship with Cisco systems ensuring that the Lawclient Telepresence is always at the forefront of technology in learning.

Francois Arlabosse

Technical Director at Digital Broadband

Francois Arlabosse, French, diplomed engineer electronic and nuclear physics from E.N.S.E.M. Nancy, graduated in mathematics from the University of Nancy and Paris, followed by a long and distinguished career in Artificial Intelligence and was instrumental in forming Framentec-Cognitech a division of Framatome when Teknowledge spinoff of Stanford University, USA formed a joint venture with Framatome.

Framatome recently changed it's name to Areva NP, and is a world leader in the design and construction of nuclear power plants, and the supply of fuel, maintenance and modernisation services. Francois was a technical adviser to the main board.

Amongst the many European ESPRIT projects he has contributed to are ESPRIT P387 'KRITIC' Knowledge Representation and Inference Techniques in Industrial Control, , ESPRIT I Project 1592 'TAO' A Therapy Adviser for Oncology, ESPRIT II Project 2043 'MARIE', Mobile Autonomous Robot in an Industrial Environment, ESPRIT II Project 2256 'ARCHON' a general purpose multi-agent system architecture for industrial applications and ESPRIT II Project 2152 ‘VIEWS’ a project for the intelligent evalution of computer aided vision of outdoors scenes.

Francois Arlabosse was appointed chair of a commitee of ERUDIT supported by the European Commission DG III Industry - Esprit Programme as a Network of Excellence. Francois is also an external assessor for technology projects supported by the European Union, the French and Canadian governments.