Professional profile
About Harriet
Employer Structures: Subsidiary, Branch, EOR/PEO, or Agency
Harriet Lawson provides strategic guidance to PRC corporate legal departments and HR leaders on the legal implications of UK employment deployment models: direct hiring through a UK entity, Employer of Record (EOR) / Professional Employer Organization (PEO), agency workers, or independent contractors.
Direct hiring via a UK legal entity (subsidiary or registered overseas branch) offers maximum corporate control and direct operational oversight, with the UK entity assuming full legal responsibilities as statutory employer under UK employment law, including unfair dismissal liabilities, statutory minimum rights, workplace pension compliance, and health and safety obligations.
The EOR/PEO model serves as a popular route for rapid market entry or low-headcount setups. While the EOR acts as the legal employer of record, Ms. Lawson routinely advises clients that operational oversight and day-to-day management can inadvertently create joint liability, agency status disputes, or permanent establishment (PE) tax risks. She reviews and drafts EOR service level agreements to protect the client's IP, enforce non-disclosure obligations, and clarify indemnity boundaries. For agency workers and independent contractors engaged through personal service companies (PSCs), she evaluates worker classification risks to prevent costly tribunal claims regarding statutory rights or retrospective worker status assessments.
Contracts, Status, and Day-to-Day Compliance
UK employment law recognizes three distinct categories of working individuals: employees, workers, and self-employed contractors. Each category commands a vastly different spectrum of statutory protections. Ms. Lawson assists companies in establishing clear, defensible contractual arrangements aligned with actual operational reality.
She drafts tailored employment contracts, director service agreements, senior executive service contracts, and comprehensive Employee Handbooks tailored to Chinese corporate groups operating in the UK. Key areas of focus include:
- Drafting enforceable restrictive covenants (non-compete, non-solicitation, non-dealing, and confidentiality clauses) adapted to the UK legal environment, where courts strictly construe restraints against public interest unless narrowly tailored.
- Structuring intellectual property assignment clauses to ensure all IP created by staff automatically vests in the employer.
- Aligning working time, statutory holiday entitlements under the Working Time Regulations 1998, sickness pay policies, and statutory family leave benefits with local standards while maintaining alignment with headquarters' global HR policies.
- Establishing disciplinary, grievance, capability, and anti-harassment policies that comply with the Acas Code of Practice on Disciplinary and Grievance Procedures.
Secondment, Global Mobility, and Immigration Alignment
Relocating key technical personnel, managers, and executive leadership from mainland China to the UK involves navigating a complex intersection of employment law, corporate structuring, and immigration rules. Ms. Lawson structures robust dual-jurisdiction secondment frameworks that protect the corporate interest while maintaining seamless cross-border mobility.
She drafts secondment agreements that clearly stipulate the host and home entity responsibilities, governing law, choice of jurisdiction, salary top-ups, housing allowances, local tax equalization mechanics, and emergency repatriation protocols. Ms. Lawson works in close coordination with corporate immigration specialists to ensure secondment terms comply with UK Home Office sponsor license conditions, including Skilled Worker and Senior or Specialist Worker routes under Global Business Mobility. Furthermore, she alerts client executive teams to permanent establishment (PE) flags where senior managers exercising managerial authority in London might unintentionally trigger UK corporate tax obligations for the overseas parent company.
Termination, Restructuring, and Collective Rights
Exiting personnel or restructuring operations in the UK requires strict adherence to statutory procedures to avoid claims for unfair dismissal, wrongful dismissal, unlawful discrimination, or whistleblowing detriment. Ms. Lawson represents corporate employers in all phases of workforce reorganization and dispute resolution.
For redundancy and restructuring, she guides management through objective selection criteria, statutory consultation timelines, and collective consultation requirements under s.188 of the Trade Union and Labour Relations (Consolidation) Act 1992 (TULRCA) when proposing 20 or more redundancies within a 90-day period. In asset purchases, service provision changes, or corporate carve-outs, she advises on the automatic transfer of staff under the Transfer of Undertakings (Protection of Employment) Regulations 2006 (TUPE), including the duty to inform and consult, measures letters, and liability indemnities. When negotiated separations are required, she drafts legally binding Settlement Agreements under s.203 of the Employment Rights Act 1996, securing comprehensive waivers of all potential statutory and common law claims. Where amicable settlement is unachievable, she acts for employers in defending Employment Tribunal proceedings.
How to Engage
Ms. Lawson provides both fixed-fee transactional packages (such as employer setup kits, handbook reviews, and template contract suites) and ongoing hourly advisory services. Engagements begin with an initial scoping call to assess the company's structural plans, followed by formal SRA-compliant engagement terms. Consultations are available virtually or at Lawson Gray's central London offices.
Capability
