Rob Salisbury Senior Partner of Gamlins, North Wales

Rob Started life as an Advocate but became Senior Partner at a relatively young age and became involved in business law. He now deals with commercial and company law, especially commercial leases, planning law, partnership and shareholder agreements and all other aspects of business life.

He is a member of the Welsh CBI Committee.

What is something that not a lot of people know about you but you WISH more people COULD know?
That I’m really quite a nice chap.      

What qualities do you feel a successful Senior/Managing Partner should have?
Above all, experience.  It is irreplaceable.  Indeed experience will have taught many of us that often the best way forward is to do nothing. However, if that does not work, then act quickly and decisively.
Also make sure that you walk around the office several time a week and say hello to people and take an interest in their roles.

Tell us about one surprising thing you’ve learned since becoming Senior/Managing Partner?
How people will often do anything to avoid telling you the truth and what the real problem is – even then most staff problems are nothing to do with the workplace.

If you hadn’t chosen Law, what do you think you'd be doing with your life?
A rural postman – you collect your deliveries in the morning – you deliver them to the outlying districts where you are well received – you go home knowing your job is well done – wonderful!

If we looked in your desk’s top drawer, what would we find?
Boxes of unused business cards which are no longer of any use as the firm has had several revamps since they were issued.

A team from Gamlins in Rhyl have taken the LawNet Challenge title, completing an 11 mile course with a 3800 foot ascent to the summit of Snowdon, in a blistering 269 minutes and 10 seconds.

The team, comprising Huw Rees, Dafydd Roberts, Ron Davison and Gwyn Pritchard, were almost 100 minutes faster than their nearest rivals.

Click here to download images from Flickr : http://www.flickr.com/photos/55414176@N07/

Taking part on the day were 80 lawyers in 17 teams, all drawn from LawNet member firms across the country.

The all-male winning team from Gamlins were spotted sprinting down from the summit, as they literally ran to victory; unlike their female counterparts from the same firm, who took a wrong turn at an early stage – leading to the usual jokes about women and directions.   However humble pie was the order of the day as the ‘Gamlins Girls’ still managed to secure second place in the Challenge, finishing in 361mins 16secs, with third place going to a team from Lincoln firm Andrew & Co, in 402mins.

The event is organised by George Coombes, LawNet’s Marketing & Services Manager, who said:  “Members enjoy the opportunity to network in a more informal setting and environment, whilst having a bit of competitive fun.  It was a close call with the weather after snowfall on Snowdon just a week before and bad rain predicted, but we had a great day.”

He added:  “Seeing the winning team descend was reminiscent of a scene from Mission Impossible, all running from the summit and one member channelling Tom Cruise in a pair of big aviator mirrored sunglasses!  The winning Gamlins team also completed the mini-orienteering challenge at checkpoint 1, whereas some teams decided to take a 30 minute time penalty and miss this out.  They certainly were deserving winners.”

Last year’s winners, Darbys from Oxford, finished sixth in 417mins 39secs and the LawNet head office team a respectable seventh in 418mins 26secs.

Team list: 

Andrew & Co LLP
Berry & Berry
Breeze & Wyles Solicitors LLP
Darbys Solicitors LLP
Gamlins (3 teams)
Gardner Leader LLP (2 teams)
Gepp & Sons
Lamb Brooks
LawNet
Mullis & Peake LLP (2 teams)
Myers Lister Price Solicitors
Oxley & Coward Solicitors LLP
Parrott & Coales LLP

ENDS