Paul Clair has been a partner at Ogletree Deakins since early 2025.
With over 15 years of experience, he advises both major international corporations and French private, public, and quasi-public entities on both advisory and litigation matters, assisting them through all phases of the employment relationship with their employees, from hiring to termination.
He has developed solid expertise in defining labor strategies and implementing “hot” reorganization operations (mass layoffs for economic reasons, job preservation plans, and the negotiation of collective voluntary termination agreements) and “planned” reorganizations (negotiation of workforce management agreements), as well as business divestitures and transfers of enterprises, on behalf of French and international groups.
Paul also advises numerous French companies on social measures aimed at enhancing their competitiveness (adjustments to working hours, profit-sharing agreements, and workforce redeployment within a geographic area).
Early in his career, he practiced for nearly a year at a law firm specializing in immigration and international mobility law in New York, then spent five years at a firm specializing in labor law, and more than seven years in the labor law department at August Debouzy as a senior associate before joining Ogletree Deakins in 2022 as Counsel.
Paul is a member of the Association of In-House Counsel in Labor Law (Avosial); he leads conferences on current labor law and case law developments and has been one of the pillars of the firm’s Labor Law Club since its creation in 2022.
Paul is bilingual in French and English.
