Harper James appoints head of employee incentives

Harper James, the full-service business law firm purpose-built to enable entrepreneurial and ambitious businesses to succeed, has appointed employee incentives specialist Samantha Lenox as head of employee incentives. She will lead and further strengthen its unique employee incentives offering and support growing client demand. Samantha’s appointment forms part of the firm’s ambitious plan to double its number of lawyers by hiring 60 new solicitors by 2025.

With over 20 years’ post qualified experience in supporting clients with the design, implementation, communication and operation of employee and management incentive arrangements, Samantha has helped the full spectrum of businesses from SMEs to multinationals to achieve their growth ambitions. She is a strong advocate for employee ownership and has supported many businesses to transition into broad-based employee ownership, commonly using the employee ownership model.

Throughout her career, Samantha has worked at top-50 law firms Simmons & Simmons and Taylor Wessing and she has also previously worked in senior roles within the tax departments of the Big 4 consulting firms, PwC and Deloitte.

Expressing excitement about her appointment with Harper James, Samantha Lenox says: “It’s exciting to be part of a firm which is disrupting the way legal services are delivered. I’m pleased to be joining Harper James because of their ability to deliver high quality advice to entrepreneurial businesses at affordable prices.

"I’m also thrilled to have the opportunity to work with a very experienced team to advise clients on employee ownership programmes and continue supporting business growth and wealth creation for all stakeholders.”

On Samantha’s appointment as head of employee incentives, legal services director Ashley Mott adds: “Having someone with Samantha's credentials on board is a significant step forward for our existing employee and equity incentive offering.

"Having a growing team of senior specialists in this important area of law, alongside our existing corporate and employment teams, enables Harper James to meet growing client demand. I’m excited that our clients will benefit from the depth and breadth of Samantha's experience and expertise.”

Samantha will be leading a team of five other specialist employee incentive and pensions experts and together they have more than 100 years’ post-qualified experience between them. The team includes employee incentives partner Ian Fraser; senior employee incentives solicitors Abby Watson, James Borshell and Liam Liddy, as well as employee incentives solicitor Tristan Johnston. The team specialises in the full range of employee incentives matters, including EOTs, EMI, CSOP, SIP and SAYE schemes, pension schemes and more.