Best brains in ...

Pensions Investment Law - founder member of the Association of Pensions Lawyers Investment Sub-Committee.

Balance of power and funding negotiations, especially around corporate change or scheme rationalisations.

Ongoing advice across the board to large schemes; gaining and maintaining the long-term confidence of trustee boards; being a trusted adviser at times of crisis as a result of years building a relationship before that arises.

Highlight of your career so far?

The real excitement is in doing good jobs for clients and winning more clients. As a mark of how well we have been doing that, it was a highlight to pick up the FT Business Pensions Lawyer of the Year award in 2007.

Toughest job you have done?

Some of the issues thrown up by the potential for high risk concentrations in liability-driven investment programmes recently, and finding innovative ways around those issues working with other lawyers in the team and the firm, have been very stimulating indeed.

And outside the UK?

I am Hong Kong-qualified and helped to shape the pensions legislation there. I registered the first-ever scheme under the Hong Kong Occupational Retirement Schemes Ordnance.

Give an example of great client service.

The London office of a large actuarial firm called us at 10am. Its client was about to do a deal, negotiated over several months in several countries, and due to sign in two days. It was advised by a large international firm of lawyers with no UK pensions function. Someone had just spotted a UK pensions problem. The Pensions Regulator's financial support direction and contribution notice powers had just been introduced. We drove 100 miles to the client's office before lunch, reviewed all the papers on site that afternoon and reached the view that the Regulator would retrospectively clear the transaction (a new concept at the time). We then gave robust advice to the client that it would be able to achieve retrospective clearance and could close the deal on time. The pensions deal breaker was removed with 24 hours to spare. (And we then did get retrospective clearance!)

Dedication to client care? Prove it!

A client of ours had its offices (and their contents) very badly damaged in the Hemel Hempstead oil refinery explosion. We were able to offer the head of legal a good working environment (albeit in central London) including wi-fi access to his own computer server and office support. We want clients to know we are part of their team and they are part of ours. The same client has offered us help with training to sharpen our thinking further on client service issues.

Best example of a creative legal solution?

I think the team's approach to the age discrimination dilemma was superb - not a potentially dangerous blanket amendment deed, but a structured checklist and a rapidly delivered and client-specific approach (for clients where changes were needed).

When have you ever given a client a real competitive edge?

Yes, several corporate restructurings (especially before the 2004 Act) have helped clients to buy and sell subsidiaries and businesses without potentially deal-threatening section 75 debts plaguing every deal.

How do you get under the skin of a client business?

We are fortunate enough to have had a lot of practice at taking on new clients. We have a take-on checklist and a process for making sure we get into clients' ways of doing things as quickly as possible. Of course each case is different - we are always learning from clients new ways about how to get to know them. Typically with a new scheme we would expect to attend some trustee meetings (at our expense) purely for the purpose of getting to know them and seeing what makes them tick. A time of crisis is not the time to be getting to know whether you trust your lawyer or not - the trust should be established at the outset.

What's your single greatest contribution to Wragge & Co's corporate responsibility?

Playing keyboards and singing in the band Oldplay at the Jam House in the 2007 Oxjam gig. The night raised several thousand pounds for Oxfam (although of course I cannot claim sole credit for that!).

What's been written or said about you that you're most proud of?

'Pound for pound, one of the best lawyers on the planet'. Michael Bonarti, Associate General Counsel, Automatic Data Processing, Inc.

'Extremely sharp and bright, he gets things done without having to shout about it.'; 'Not many things are a problem.'; 'Glyn Ryland is well respected as the head of the team. According to peers, not only is he a skilled pensions lawyer, but "he manages a big team very well".' Chambers UK