Jen Paton

For Ms Paton it was an opportunity to enjoy the recognition – but also to pay tribute to her colleagues. “I was genuinely delighted and surprised – and I was up against some fierce competition,” she says.

“But even if it was a significant individual award, I’m not the only person working on deals at Shoosmiths. We have an excellent team in Scotland and nationally, so any recognition I’m getting does feel like it should be for the wider team as well though I was personally honoured to receive the award.”

The accolade had another significance, pointing as it did to Ms Paton being an integral part of a successful, all-female corporate team in Scotland – something that is highly unusual.

This is even as the profession increasingly embraces equality in several areas, with the Law Society of Scotland reporting that 80 per cent of Scottish solicitors and accredited paralegals now feeling that gender equality has improved in the profession over the past five years.

It also marked her long association with Shoosmiths, at which she trained back when it was Archibald Campbell & Harley, qualifying in 2011 then leaving for Shepherd and Wedderburn in 2020 to re-join the firm in 2022.

Now as a leading associate she advises a range of clients who include investors, major corporates, management teams and owner managers on domestic and cross-border venture capital, private equity and M&A transactions across a diversity of sectors, working with businesses in the healthcare, energy, hospitality, transport and technology sectors.

During 2024, she and her colleagues advised on 30-plus transactions and recorded deals exceeding £500 million, including several in the £25-£350 million range which are set to close this year.

Examples include advising the shareholders of Artificial Lift Performance Limited, Artificial Lift Performance LLC and Artificial Lift Performance Inc on their sale to US corporate Champion X and advising the majority shareholders of Engine B Limited on their sale to CLA (CliftonLarsonAllen LLP).

Growing up near Stewarton in east Ayrshire and with no lawyers in her family (her mother worked for the local authority while her father was engaged in advertising sales for newspapers) Ms Paton traces her interest in the profession to wondering whether to study law or politics and international relations at university, as both suited her aptitude for problem solving.

“My Advanced Higher modern studies involved a dissertation on criminology – and if criminals were born or made – which intrigued me. I’d interviewed a lecturer at Kilmarnock College as part of this and he gave some excellent advice which essentially was that if someone had the chance to do a law degree, they should take it –  as the law gives a wider world view and an insight into solving problems,” she says.

“That was very sage advice which stays with me after more than 20 years; I took it to heart and I’m very glad that I did.”

Armed with that sound counsel, she studied law at the University of Aberdeen and set off on her lasting relationship with Shoosmiths, entering the profession during a particularly challenging but interesting time just after the global financial crisis.

While her traineeship included litigation, she was not hugely attracted by the contentious aspect of court appearances and corporate law allowed her to develop her organisational and project management skills.

“Corporate appealed to my skill sets which has meant that over the past decade or so I’ve been able to manage increasingly complex projects and as my skills and experience in this area have developed, the size of the deals has increased.

For many people, the sheer size of these deals would appear rather daunting. Ms Paton laughs: “We often joke that the smaller-value deals often entail more complexities but at the end of the day the big, multinational deals are still transactions that need to be approached in the same way as any other.”

Sometimes, she adds, the real enjoyment in corporate law comes from acting for an owner-managed business where the result will impact the client’s prospects for retirement.

“It may not have six zeros at the end of the number but it’s nevertheless really important to them – and this is a service industry, so we always want to get the best possible outcome for our clients.”

When it comes to deals, she adds: “We certainly want to be that trusted adviser and I feel heartened when a client wants to pick up the phone to talk to me. Even if it’s not something explicitly corporate related it’s good to know they can find someone to help, and helping people is really the thing that motivates me, whether it’s clients or colleagues.”

As in all other areas, recent events are reshaping the role of the corporate lawyer. “Sadly, we now have less champagne at completion meetings – but while the construct of a deal remains essentially the same, what has changed is the way we do transactions. I’ve been involved in three deals in the past year in which we’ve acted for the sellers to US corporates, and it’s all been done remotely.

“Increasingly it doesn’t matter where you are in the world. That has been a major shift over the past 10 years or more and one that was hugely accelerated by the Covid pandemic with many things being done faster than previously over applications such as Teams.”

This has, she adds, been enhanced by other technology and especially now AI, in areas such as document automation. “Getting a deal done can now be streamlined quite significantly – though the value of a lawyer remains as a source of strategic advice on how to obtain the best result for the client.”

Living in North Berwick, Ms Paton says for her relaxation would mean fine food and fine wine, though keeping children aged six and three occupied largely precludes these luxuries for now. “When I’m not with them or at work – and if it’s not blowing a gale on the east coast – just getting out to walk on my own is a rare treat,” she says.

Shoosmiths, which was founded in Northampton in 1845 and now has 13 offices across the UK adopts a hybrid work policy, though Ms Paton values shared time in the Edinburgh office. “I believe it’s useful to be there for at least a few days a week; younger colleagues in particular gain a lot through learning through osmosis.”

She is also “quietly confident” about the prospects for her team during 2025, noting a busy past year, with a notable uptick in deals and M&A activity levels that she believes will continue.  

And with her Corporate Rising Star award augmenting the Up and Coming Lawyer of the Year citation she received at the Law Awards of Scotland in 2016, there’s little doubt she will contribute noticeably to that potential.