Maguire Family Law is 10 today!

A decade of Family Law services

1 March 2010 saw us open our doors from a home office in Cheadle.

Armed with only a handful of cases, ‘Day One’ involved an international child relocation case in the High Court before Mr Justice Ryder (as he then was).

That was just the start and a glance back brings back fond (and some stressful!) memories of ‘urgent’ faxes, the ever-developing letterhead, the reliance on Royal Mail or DX (which seemed to arrive later and later each day), volumes of paper and weekends then consumed with filing that paper away!

But not to forget the use of local and friendly courts – most of which have sadly been closed and now the strain caused on the Family Justice system.

10 years on

Now we are a team of 17 people (including 13 solicitors) with offices in Wilmslow and Knutsford, Cheshire together with meeting rooms in Manchester, London and Stockton Heath.

We have embraced (or attempted to…) social media, agile working, paper lite or paperless offices, all singing/all dancing case management systems (in theory), cyber security and dare we  say it…GDPR!

We have won awards and been shortlisted for many others. We are Lexcel accredited. We are ranked Top Tier in the Legal 500 for 2020 (which is lovely achievement on our 10^th anniversary). And we have had several reported cases – where the law has been shaped.

The good stuff

Awards etc. are great but it is about much more than that. It is about what happens each day.

Yes, time flies and especially when you are busy. But it is important to step back and look at the good things that happen each day, the glue that really makes us an amazing team.

To quote Aristole: “We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, then, is not an act but a habit.”

Our work is cutting edge in terms of looking for innovative solutions every day for our family law clients and not problems. We have rolled out a ‘service pledge’ to clients and a ‘road map’ – to take you to ‘Day One of your new life’.

Wisdom and learning

With time comes experience and here as some things I have learnt:

• Good business is about good people – surround yourself with good people

• Never stand still – complacency is fatal

• Be organised, plan and never lose focus

• Communication includes listening

• Make decisions, make changes – worrying won’t get the job done

• Always take a walk a lunchtime – we all need fresh air

The future

As we have all entered this new decade, there is a general awareness of how times have changed and are changing.

We do not know what is around the corner and certainly there will be challenges ahead. But it is important to embrace them; and the chances are that great things will happen!

Thank you

Finally, I would like to thank our team very much (past and present) and to thank all our clients.

We live and breathe by our high standards and word of mouth recommendation. Nothing speaks more than the glowing testimonials we have received over the last 10 years.

We are very happy and proud to have helped so many people locally, nationally and across the world.

James