Sue Kench, KWM’s global head, to step down

Following media reporting earlier this week, a KWM spokesperson has confirmed with Lawyers Weekly that the global chief executive of the BigLaw firm, Sue Kench, will be stepping down at the end of her second term, in December 2024.

A statement on Kench’s departure from the role will be made “in due course”, the spokesperson added.

As reported by The Australian Financial Review, the firm’s global management committee is yet to decide when it will appoint a replacement.

Kench first became a partner in the real estate practice of legacy Mallesons Stephen Jaques in 1996 and has since held several management and leadership positions in the firm over the past two decades.

She became the first female managing partner of KWM back in mid-2013 (and the first woman to lead one of Australia’s so-called “big six” law firms) and then was appointed as the firm’s global head in mid-2017. Since then – in her current position as global chief executive – she has led the development and implementation of the firm’s international strategy and is responsible for integrating the firm’s international operations, according to KWM’s website.

In mid-2020, Kench appeared on The Lawyers Weekly Show to discuss the response of BigLaw firms to the global COVID-19 pandemic and reflected on how her mantra of “Not too soon, not too late” guided KWM into making timely, considered decisions in response to the pandemic and its broader impacts.

In the same episode, Kench argued that Australia has been a big beneficiary of globalisation, and firms at the big end of town must continue to look outward as the nation pivots in a post-pandemic world.

“It’s about taking opportunities. Know there’s no one person who’s the smartest person in the room, bring great teams together, make decisions and move on,” she said at the time.

“Each of the global law firms will have their different strategies and their priorities, but ours is certainly one which is very centred and grounded on growth, which is expected to come from Asia, and we feel we’re very well positioned for it.”

MORE TO COME.

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