Hilary advises on all aspects of contentious and non-contentious employment law and has wide-ranging experience in advising on people management issues, litigation, restrictive covenants, board restructures and business reorganisations. She acts for clients across all industries, with particular experience in the retail, media and finance sectors.
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Expertise
Non-contentious
- Advising on sensitive personnel matters including dismissal, disciplinary and grievance procedures
- Managing sickness absence
- Board disputes
- Restrictive covenants and team moves
- Discrimination
- Whistleblowing
- Employment documentation including terms and conditions of employment, staff handbooks, directors service agreements, and consultancy agreements
- Data protection including managing data subject access requests
- Settlement agreements
- Restructuring, redundancy and collective consultation
- TUPE and outsourcing and tenders
- Employment law training and workshops
Contentious
- Tribunal claims including unfair dismissal, discrimination and whistleblowing
- High Court claims including breach of contract and injunction proceedings
- Mediation
Experience
- Advising a leading media company on relocation and collective redundancy issues following its relocation to Media City.
- Assisting a prominent international hotel group on TUPE and other employment aspects of its purchase of a UK hotel chain.
- Successfully defending a City financial institution in Employment Tribunal proceedings relating to allegations of constructive dismissal, unfair dismissal and sex discrimination following the rejection of a part-time work request.
- Advising a leading financial institution on an acrimonious dispute at Board level and subsequent removal of its CEO.
- Acting for a well-known talent agency on a threatened injunction following its hire of a high-profile agent, from a competitor.
Please note: The experience list above may include examples of work completed prior to joining Keystone Law.
Recognition
Legal Week Intelligence Client Partner of the Year 2017
“The best lawyers are those that treat your money as their own. Hilary O’Connor is an example of someone commercial, quick and brilliant”, Dr Deborah Prince of the British Heart Foundation talking to Legal Business in 2013
“Hilary O’Connor is a ‘star’” Legal 500 2015
“The ‘really impressive’ and ‘extremely capable’ Hilary O’Connor …” Chambers UK 2014
Ranked as a Leading Individual in both Legal 500 and Chambers and Partners.
Career
Hilary qualified as a solicitor in 1991. Prior to joining Keystone Law in 2016, she worked at the following firms:
- King & Wood Mallesons
- Clifford Chance