Culture

Our culture is grounded first in our regulatory responsibilities and our four values:

• Be Open: Communicate openly and consistently. Ask questions, share views & opinions. Listen to and respect the opinions of others. Seek out diverse perspectives to drive improvements and positive outcomes.
• Think Team: Proactively collaborate, share knowledge, insights and opportunities with colleagues and clients. Support the people we work with - listen, be responsive, respectful and courteous. Create an environment where everyone feels confident taking part.
• Make a Difference: Invest in the success and ambitions of our clients and colleagues. Understand and deliver advice that works in context and is mindful of the environment within which we operate. Care about our impact inside and outside of the firm and our role delivering the right results for our clients.
• Always Grow: Strive to be the best we can be; commit to continuous improvement in all that we do. Ensure that we grow ourselves and also support the growth of our colleagues, our clients and the wider community.

Our culture and values come to life and are embedded across the firm through various initiatives including: 

• Our learning & development programme: We have a range of programmes to support development at various career stages and to suit individual need. We want our people to have a choice about how they grow and progress. Our development initiatives reflect this and include a variety of options such as: off-site/specialist training, study funding, mentoring, promotion development programmes and ‘power’ skills training, amongst others. 
• Our focus on wellbeing: We have and continue to invest in wellbeing resources and support, including mental health awareness training, departmental wellbeing and culture champions, also firm wide access to the “Calm” app to help provide additional support for all of our people.
• Our employee benefits: We have a comprehensive benefits package spanning financial, health, pension and lifestyle options to support our people as part of their total reward. All employees also share in the firm’s success through our firm wide annual bonus. 
• Our focus on diversity & inclusion: We take a proactive approach to equality, diversity and inclusion. This includes a firm wide Diversity Group that runs a programme of education and celebration to drive awareness and change, our hybrid ‘ways of working policy’ to enable greater flexibility, support for parents, our apprenticeship and work experience programmes, transparent hiring and promotion procedures, and much more.
• Our Ashfords Expects initiative: ‘Ashfords Expects’ helps everyone at Ashfords to understand what their responsibilities are and the standards they are expected to meet in their interactions with each other, with clients and with the firm’s wider network. This enables us to create a positive working environment where everyone is clear what is expected. It also ensures we maintain a strong reputation as lawyers that clients can count on to deliver.