Nicky Cranfield

Nicky Cranfield

Head of Employment

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Nicky trained at Eversheds LLP (now Eversheds Sutherland LLP), where she qualified as an employment lawyer in 2010, and spent time working in both the international employment law team and the core UK team, advising employers across a range of sectors. Nicky went on to expand her practice to advising senior executives, during her time at Fox Williams LLP, and also gained valuable experience from working in-house, through a virtual secondment from Konexo to Amazon.

Nicky provides advice on a wide range of employment law topics to both employers and senior executives. Nicky has extensive experience advising on the whole spectrum of issues and documentation that are intrinsic to the employment lifecycle: from preparing and advising on employment contracts, consultancy agreements and policies, via dealing with disciplinary, grievance, discrimination, performance, sickness and other day-to-day people issues, all the way through to managing employee terminations and senior executive exits, including the drafting and review of settlement agreements, as well as conducting claims in the Employment Tribunal. Nicky can also assist in relation to business reorganisations and redundancies and provide advice on TUPE in business transfers and outsourcings.

Relevant experience includes:

  • Drafting a suite of employment documentation for a start-up Intellectual Property law firm, including: employment and consultancy agreements; a staff handbook and associated policies, and an employee privacy notice;
  • Assisting a digital media client to implement a flexible homeworking scheme and cross-border employment and consultancy contracts;
  • Supporting a restauranteur client through the Covid19 crisis and advising on furlough agreements for its employees;
  • Being a first point of contact for day-to-day HR queries for numerous clients;
  • Advising founders on their exits (and companies on founder exits), particularly in relation to the interplay between the concurrent roles of employee, director and shareholder;
  • Acting for a magazine publisher client to defend allegations of breach of contract, harassment, sex discrimination, whistleblowing and unfair dismissal;
  • Securing a substantial settlement for a senior executive, against a FTSE 100 Company, in a case involving potential constructive dismissal, whistleblowing, sex discrimination and age discrimination;
  • Managing a collective redundancy consultation for a US parent company, in relation to its manufacturing sites in the UK;
  • Advising an IT infrastructure provider on a second generation outsourcing and associated restructure and redundancies;
  • Providing employment law support in relation to the €1.7billion acquisition of the packaging division of a Swedish company, including collating employment law advice from over 20 jurisdictions in respect of information and consultation requirements.

Fine Print

Key practices

Employment

Education

University of Leeds and BPP Law School

Legal roles

Eversheds Sutherland LLP, Fox Williams LLP, Konexo

Memberships

Employment Lawyers Association

A social cause I care about

I am a trustee for a local charity called PATA, which supports the development of high quality, accessible early years childcare for all.

Other interests

Spending time with my family, which usually involves some energetic activities to tire out the kids: be that bike riding, puddle jumping and trampolining at home, or fun on the beach or the slopes when we are on holiday – we don’t sit still much! So the perfect antidote is to relax with a glass of red wine and a good book once the kids are in bed.

News, Insights & Resources

Blog

Hiring and Firing Senior Employees – Webinar Recording

On the 22nd March we held a webinar to discuss the legal ins and outs of hiring and firing employees. Ignition’s Head of Employment, Nicky Cranfield led the webinar, covering everything from reasons for “fair” dismissal, to settlement agreements. Below we have a video recording for those of you who weren’t able to make it on the day.

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Insights

IR35 (again)?

Postponed from April 2020, this time around, the new off-payroll working rules, more commonly known as “IR35” are set to come into force as of 6 April 2021.

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