About

With responsibility for all Adecco Group companies in France and responsible for all areas of law except tax, which is monitored by the finance department, the Adecco Group’s legal team in France is 30-strong. Due to the company’s pre-eminence in the human resources sector, the team boasts a particularly capable employment and labour law department. This manages all employment contracts, litigation and supports Adecco’s operational staff, which amounts to approximately 1,000 questions per month from the company’s 850 agencies. Aymar de Franqueville leads the legal team in France, and reports directly to the president of the company in France, and corporate general counsel Dr Martin Henrich in Zurich. ‘Since I have been in charge of this department, I have always wanted the organisation to be as close as possible to the operations’, he explains. ‘Lawyers are business partners close to the company’s activity and we have a decisive role in strategic choices’. As such, a new organisational structure has been adopted by the team which now includes data privacy and social protection law in addition to the team’s previous responsibilities. An example of the legal innovation that the Adecco legal team in France has enacted came with its creation, along with the Federation of Temporary Employment, a specific type of contract for temporary workers. This agreement, the permanent temporary contract, did not exist prior to this project, but the company now has more than 19,000 such contracts. ‘Our philosophy has the management of human and business risk at its centre’, says Mr Franqueville. ‘Lawyers are at the disposal of the development of our company’s activities, and we must respect our commercial social purpose and our mission statement at all times’.