Joanna Hughes
Joanna Hughes Solicitor Apprenticeships
Joanna is the Founder and Director of Joanna Hughes Solicitor Apprenticeships. A driving force in Joanna leaving the large international firms where she worked as a solicitor for 25 years and setting up this company was to improve socio-economic diversity in the legal profession. More generally, a desire to make the legal industry more inclusive and less excluding underpins everything she does. She puts people first and her work in the last year has been recognized in the 2023 Government National Apprenticeship Awards with a Highly Commended Award as a champion of apprenticeships in London.
In her role as a Member of the City of London Law Society Training Committee, she is working with the Chair of that Committee, Patrick McCann, to greatly increase the number of solicitor apprenticeship opportunities available in the City of London. This work has been described by the Chair of the City of London Law Society as one of the most innovative and game-changing initiatives in the legal profession we will see for some time
Joanna holds a number of Patron and advisory roles including being a Patron of the Multicultural Apprenticeship Alliance. In May 2021 she was appointed to join the Taskforce to boost the socio-economic diversity at senior levels in UK financial and professional services, as a Working Group member, and was nominated by the Mayor of the City of London for the Freedom of the City of London for her work in the Taskforce.