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Bird & Bird wins six awards for women in law -Czech Republic winning the award for the first time

Bird & Bird was recently recognised as a leading firm in terms of female talent and the promotion of gender diversity, taking home six awards at the Euromoney Europe Women in Business Law awards, including three individual and three country specific awards. Partners Morag Macdonald (London), and Ulrike Gruebler (Hamburg), won awards for Best in Patent and Rising Star: IP respectively, with partner Catherine Erkelens (Brussels) taking the Best in Aviation award for the second year running. The Netherlands and France both won Best Firm in Country/Region, the Netherlands for the third and France for the second consecutive year, with the Czech Republic winning the award for the first time.

The awards celebrate the achievements of women in the legal sector across Europe, and honour firms that set the standard in terms of female-friendly work practices.

Individual winners were judged on their professional accomplishments as well as advocacy and influence within their field over the last year. Firm and country winners were judged on their ability to support the development of women in the legal profession and provide work/life programmes to enable women to pursue legal careers. Criteria included the ratio of female-to-male lawyers and the retention of women, from associate to partner level.

David Kerr, CEO of Bird & Bird said: "We are honoured to receive such high accolades – at a country level, to recognise the ambitious diversity initiatives of our firm, and at an individual level, to acknowledge the high quality legal advice of our partners. Bird & Bird is committed to promoting diversity. This is reflected in our most recent global lateral hires, where more than 40% of new partners appointed in the 2014/15 financial year, were women. These awards reflect the ongoing efforts of Bird & Bird internationally to nurture female talent, and we are delighted to accept them."

Bird & Bird was shortlisted for four 'Firm of the Year' awards, fourteen 'Best in Country/Region' awards, and nine individual awards, making it the most successful year to date.