Mary Bonsor

First Name

Mary

Last Name

Bonsor

Present Position / Designation

Founder

Bio-Professional Background (Brief)

Coming from a background of working as a Property Litigator at top City Law Firm, when Mary first founded Flex Legal in 2017, she was driven by a profound mission to revolutionise the legal industry. Initially, the company was focused on 'on-demand' interim legal recruitment, providing an innovative solution for legal teams grappling with fluctuating workloads. Flex Legal empowered these teams to seamlessly match their workloads with their capacity, all whilst creating life-changing opportunities for ambitious law graduates eager to gain valuable legal work experience, as well as qualified lawyers seeking a better work/life balance.

As Flex Legal continued to evolve, in 2021 Mary introduced the groundbreaking Flex Trainee scheme, an extraordinary social mobility initiative. This visionary programme was meticulously designed to support aspiring solicitors from underrepresented backgrounds to qualify in-house via the SQE. In doing so, Mary has not only expanded access to legal careers for many, but has also played a pivotal role in fostering diversity and inclusivity within the wider legal profession.

In the words of Flex Trainee, Nazrin: ‘Diversity and inclusion are not only key for individual success, but also for the progress of the whole profession.’

More Details

Mary's story:

I remember walking around the city while I was doing the GDL and the LPC, desperate for work. Eventually, I managed to find work experience as a secretary for a shipping arbitrator, but it wasn’t easy to get there. Fast forward a few years and I was a qualified solicitor working in litigation. I was staring in the face of an imminent court deadline with forty huge bundles to make. I remember sitting at my desk and looking out of the window, and seeing a group of Kaplan law students exactly where I had been a few years ago.

I knew from experience that those students would have jumped at the chance to get legal work experience, and I knew associates like myself were desperate for their help. Suddenly, the idea for Flex Legal was born.

Shortly after I met James, an experienced software developer, and we began working together on a tech platform that could connect law students to firms and in-house teams as efficiently as possible. We analysed what was taking too long in traditional recruitment, and how we could use tech to make it easier.

Fast forward several years and Flex Legal is an award-winning platform with a huge roster of clients including magic circle law firms and many large in-house legal teams. We have over 5,000 paralegals on our platform and have since expanded to offer lawyers on a flexible basis. We have very ambitious plans to help improve retention in the profession and ensure people can work as they want, when they want.”

Firm / Company Name

Flex Legal