If Meredith Connell wanted to change the story about where it is going, it just made a very deliberate move with 21 promotions.
After months of scrutiny over senior departures, a strategic review, and a lingering question about whether the firm was in transition or simply treading water, MC has promoted 21 lawyers to partner, senior associate and associate ranks, and made a lateral partner hire and a new office play.
What Has Meredith Connell Just Announced?
MC confirmed the promotion in a release fronted by management board chair Sean Kinsler, who framed the round as recognition of lawyers “stepping into leadership roles” at the firm. Five of those promotions are to partner, Daniel McGivern, Danielle Christoffersen, David Wiseman, Elena Mok and Sarah Murphy.
The remaining sixteen span senior associate and associate level.
Running alongside the internal promotions and announced separately, in the same breath is the arrival of local government specialist Jessica Easton, (pictured) who joins MC as a lateral hire from her eponymous firm Easton Legal and who will now lead MC’s new Tauranga office to build up its local government work.
MC has form making this kind of local government play when it lured another law firm operator and local government specialist Nathan Speir back to the partnership in 2024 for similar reasons.
Easton’s appointment is a more assertive, expansionary move by MC that lines up with rising regional demand for public law and regulatory expertise.
Why Has Meredith Connell Been Losing Partners?
Readers will recall we’ve been tracking this closely. An October restructure cost the firm four partners in one hit, out of a partnership that stood at 30 as at June last year.
That followed a longer run of senior exits including Chris Merrick’s departure to set up his own tikanga- and Pacific-law focused practice, Nick Malarao’s move to Richmond Chambers, and most recently Jacob Barry’s exit to Lindsay Francis & Mangan.
Three more senior litigators have since surfaced at Richmond Chambers, a pattern that’s now consistent enough to look like a trend line rather than coincidence.
That’s hardly unusual in a hot disputes market where litigators peel off to boutiques and independent chambers all the time. But it’s notable given MC’s historic positioning as a career destination rather than some stepping stone, and it’s what’s made the firm’s parallel “strategic review”, which was branded as officially a refocus on public interest litigation and which lead to ongoing speculation about whether it’s recalibration or reaction.
Who Are Meredith Connell’s New Partners?
The five internally promoted partners skew toward the firm’s core Crown and regulatory work. McGivern is a commercial litigator recently returned from London, where he worked on competition disputes; Christoffersen and Wiseman round out the litigation and local government benches; Mok specialises in disciplinary prosecutions and regulatory proceedings; Murphy is a senior Crown prosecutor with High Court and Court of Appeal experience acting for the Commerce Commission and government departments.
In isolation any promotion round is routine but in the MC talent-drain context, this one feels different. Maybe, for instance, its an attempt to demonstrate that leadership gaps, real or perceived, are being filled from within.
Is This Damage Control or Genuine Growth?
The timing is hard to ignore. A firm that shed four partners in an October restructure on top of a longer exit list stretching back to 2021 and now announces a wave of promotions and a new office. So: proactive strategy, or reactive positioning?
It may well be both. MC appears to be tightening its structure and offering and plugging gaps, as well as doing some succession planning.
So the question now is whether retention will take hold or do the five newly minted partners become the next names on Richmond Chambers’ roster?
How will the Tauranga expansion work out? Will it lead to meangingful growth in a city with some local power in the legal fraternity, or is it more symbolic?
At least the firm has changed the narrative from departures to promotions. Good work on that front at least.
