Credit Suisse First Boston (CSFB) has named United States-based attorney Stephen Volk as its vice chairman. He will work with new chief executive John Mack to try to make the firm a more cohesive unit.

CSFB, the investment banking arm of Switzerland's second biggest bank, Credit Suisse Group, now has a staff of 28,000, with much of its growth attributed to last year's acquisition of US investment bank Donaldson, Lufkin and Jenrette.

Mack, a Wall Street veteran who had been president of Morgan Stanley until March, replaced former CSFB head Allen Wheat last week.

Under Wheat the firm developed a reputation for being split into many different groups that worked mostly on their own. Mack has stressed the importance of company wide teamwork for CSFB to grow.

"Steve is ideally suited to assist with the challenges we face now, having provided sound strategic guidance to many companies working through major acquisitions and organisational change," Mack said in a statement.

"Steve's unique ability to build a sense of shared purpose among diverse groups of people will be invaluable as everyone at CSFB works together to forge a unified team," he added.

Volk has been a partner with US law firm Shearman and Sterling where he advised companies including General Electric and Viacom on how to deal with acquisitions and organisational changes.

Volk developed Shearman and Sterling's mergers and acquisitions department in the mid-1970s and was its senior partner from 1991 to 2001.

Volk arrives at CSFB at a time when it faces a number of challenges, including declining revenue and a United States federal investigation into whether its sale of shares of initial public offerings during the dot-com boom broke US securities laws.

Credit Suisse group chairman and chief executive, Lukas Mühlemann has called for tighter controls at CSFB.

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