Announcing our Finalists | Legal ESG Awards 2025

May 21, 2025

AUTHOR Inside Practice

The Legal ESG Awards UK highlight the significant influence of legal experts in creating a responsible business landscape and challenge the profession to innovate and lead in integrating ESG principles.


The winners will be announced at Legal ESG London on 8 July 2025


Join us in celebrating our finalists:


ESG Practice / Client Service Award

This award celebrates a law firm that has excelled in delivering client services with a strong focus on ESG principles. It acknowledges the firm's efforts to incorporate ESG considerations into client advice, transactions, and litigation practices, setting a benchmark for ESG excellence in service clients of the legal profession.


Law Firm Internal Operations Award

This award recognizes the law firm with exceptional commitment to sustainable business practices. It honors the integration of environmental, social, and governance (ESG) principles into the firm's purpose, strategy and operations, reflecting a dedication to responsible business conduct and a sustainable approach to legal practice. 



Law Firm Single ESG Initiative Award

This award is presented to the law firm that exemplifies outstanding ESG leadership in the development of and implementation of a single ESG initiative. It recognizes innovative approaches to identifying, developing and implementing a single ESG initiative which is material and core to the business strategy.


Law Firm ESG Employee Engagement Award

This award recognized the greater impact achieved through engaging the firm's employees in ESG initiatives and programs.


Law Firm ESG Client Collaboration Award

This award will go to those who can demonstrate meaningful and material collaboration between law firms and their client(s) toward a more sustainable, just and equitable society. Together, we can accomplish greater success.



Law Firm Outstanding ESG Leader Award

Given the key role which law firms play in guiding and advising their clients’ ESG strategies, it is crucial that their law firms are setting the example. It takes an ESG leader within the law firm to ensure the firm is “walking the talk” as well as advising their clients on ESG. This award recognizes as exemplary law firm ESG Leader. 



Paul Watchman Young Lawyer of The Year Award

Named in honour of Professor Paul Watchman, this award celebrates a young lawyer* who embodies his passion for ESG law and the development of future legal leaders. In collaboration with his daughter Carla Parsons, Senior Associate at Mills & Reeve, this award recognizes a young legal professional who shows exceptional promise in driving ESG initiatives and shaping the future of responsible legal practice. 

  • Ming Zee, A&O Sherman
  • Christina Chambers, Mishcon de Reya, Purpose Team


Stay up to date with our winner announcements on our LinkedIn. Best of luck to all our finalists!


For more information: Legal ESG Awards  // Legal ESG London


LATEST

AI is accelerating. The question is whether your knowledge can keep up?

By Inside Practice • April 14, 2026
From Experimentation to Infrastructure: AI x KM Returns to New York on April 29 The legal profession has crossed an inflection point. Generative AI adoption among legal professionals has more than doubled in the past year. According to the 8am 2026 Legal Industry Report, 69% of legal professionals report personally using AI. The Wolters Kluwer Future Ready Lawyer 2026 report paints an even sharper picture: more than 90% of lawyers surveyed now use at least one AI tool in their daily work. The experimentation phase is over. The question is no longer whether to adopt AI, but whether firms have the knowledge foundations to make it reliable, scalable, and defensible in practice. That question sits at the center of AI x KM , a one-day, in-person program taking place at the SUNY Global Center in New York City on April 29, 2026. The event brings together Chief Knowledge Officers, innovation leaders, technology executives, and partners to address what may be the most consequential infrastructure challenge facing law firms today: building the knowledge backbone that AI depends on.

From Reporting to Operating Infrastructure: What Inside Legal Data London Confirmed About the Modern Firm

By Inside Practice • April 14, 2026
Inside Legal Data: London confirmed a clear market inflection point. Data strategy in law firms is no longer a modernization initiative or positioning exercise, but the operating logic of the modern firm. It is increasingly shaping how legal work is priced, delivered, and governed, while enabling AI deployment, risk management, and the conversion of institutional knowledge into competitive advantage. The strategic divide in the sector is now real and accelerating.

The Redesign Imperative: Who Will Rebuild the Law Firm Before the Market Does?

By Inside Practice • April 3, 2026
Inside Legal AI Brief: 04/02/26 March 2026 was the month legal AI stopped being optional and became operating infrastructure.
Inside Legal KM Toronto

Canadian Data Sovereignty Isn’t Abstract Anymore: KM, Cross-Border Risk, & Legal Realities

By Inside Practice • February 6, 2026
Data sovereignty has become an operational knowledge management issue for Canadian law firms. Learn where data lives, how it moves, and what risks firms must manage.