I am often astounded by the responses I get when I express interest in a company or a product through a website. Sometimes I get no contact from the company at all, which speaks volumes about that company and is likely to result in me never showing interest in them or their products again.

Sometimes I get contacted a few days later which again makes me think that I’m nowhere near the top of their priorities as an interested hot prospect.

Other times I get a call almost immediately from someone really keen to talk to me about my areas of interest and how the benefits they can bring that can help me address my issue.

This is equally true of all other marketing methods where the response from the companies doing the marketing can be very variable.

It seems bizarre to me, particularly in this day and age, that marketers often put out great and effective marketing programmes using a range of techniques, but the process of responding to the enquiries stimulated by those enquiries just doesn’t carry the same urgency.

We all know that hot leads don’t stay hot very long these days with the many pressures business leaders are under. We also all know that new prospects are unlikely to only be looking at your solution and are more likely to be looking at a number of options to make comparisons of price and performance. The one company that responds quickest and most positively to leads and enquiries often ends up in pole position to win the business.

Think of a lead like this; if your average order value, or value of a new customer over the first year is, say, £10,000 and every 10 leads or enquiries result in a new order or new customer, then EVERY lead or enquiry that you treat right is worth £1,000. Focuses the mind a bit huh?

 Mark Slade is Managing Partner of Fidler & Pepper Solicitors. He qualified as a solicitor in 1989, and became a partner in 1990. Up until 1999 he ran the Domestic Conveyancing department. In 1999 he gave up the conveyancing side to concentrate on running the web business.

In April 2002 he took over as Managing Partner.  His hobbies include fast old cars and surfing. He is married with three daughters, and is very, very tired.  He wants to travel the world, meet all kinds of interesting people and be kind to small furry animals.

 

How would others describe you in three words?
This has taken a long time to work out - I know different people will look at me completely differently:

Determined.  Arrogant.  Approachable.

What has been your best professional moment to date?
When we found out we were in the Sunday Times top 50 best small companies to work for. 

What has been your worst/most embarrassing professional moment to date?
Before I qualified I went on a hearing for assessment of a file for someone else. They'd forgotten to keep a copy of the file so I was doing something I'd never done before, without the necessary documents to answer any questions. After about 10 minutes of questions to which I had no answer the judge threw the file at me literally and ordered me to come back again with the person who owned the file.

Tell us about one surprising thing you’ve learned since becoming Managing Partner?
The amount of personal worry you have to absorb, and also the power of sharing that worry with your partners - in terms of how helpful it is to discuss the problems with them.

If you hadn't chosen Law, what do you think you'd be doing with your life?
Something business and IT related - on-line businesses - possibly linked to cars - I'm a real petrolhead.

If we looked in your desk’s top drawer, what would we find?
A mess containing one-off documents I'll never need, business cards, a shaver, stapler, and paperclips.

Non Executive Directors (NEDs) have long been a common feature in the make up of Boards in companies large and small. They are also widely used in the NHS, mutual organisations and not-for-profit concerns.

But until now they have rarely been seen in professional practice.

Could that be about to change? 

In the legal sector where change is being driven by new entrants, the formation of ABS’ and new investment into firms, what could an NED bring to assist the leaders of law firms of the future?

Here are some suggestions:

• Support and strengthen the firm's management and provide an independent view
• Bring wider business experience and thinking to the firm
• Make a contribution to business planning, strategy and policy making
• Objectively assess the firm’s performance making recommendations for improvement
• Be an outside voice to challenge current thinking and practice
• Possess the gravitas to stand firm when he/she believes Partners/Directors are acting in an inappropriate manner
• Have the skills and experience to advise management when difficult decisions need making and communicating
• Often provide excellent connections to third parties who could be useful to the business e.g. financial sources, IT providers and potential clients
• Could provide a degree of comfort to suppliers, bankers and funders

It is important that NED’s are focussed on matters at the Partnership or Board level and should not become involved in the day to day operations of the business. The Partners/Board should seek their opinion and guidance on matters of complexity before agreeing to sign off on key issues e.g. a senior appointment, remuneration policy or compliance issues.

An outsider such as a NED may have a more objective view of external factors affecting the business than the partners and will not be afraid to comment and contribute accordingly in the longer term interests of the business.

If law firms are considering making such appointments it is important they do so to add value and experience to the business.  NED’s should be appointed to bring particular experience not currently available to the Partnership/Board, be seen as impartial with wide ranging experience and with personal qualities of the highest level.

Market forces and competition will drive change in the legal sector and with that will come the need for new thinking, new structures and better management in law firms. Non-executives can bring added dynamism and flair to the new breed of the future. I predict we'll see a lot more NED appointments in the short to medium term as firms broaden their focus and strategy in order to compete.

 

 

 

An adbridged version of this article appeared in the May issue of Managing Partner Magazine.

 

Helen Hamilton-Shaw is director of services with leading law firm network LawNet.  She reports on the role played by IT in strategic and practical terms amongst the network’s independent law firm members, which range from £2m to £15m turnover.

Information technology is set to be a game changer as we enter the new era of post-LSA markets, where commoditised services are likely to push an increasing number of legal service transactions online. 

For the mid-sized, independent firms that make up LawNet, we are seeing customer-facing offerings that range from online wills to mobile apps targeted at employers. 

But while online sales may be the headline grabber, it’s just as likely to be the backroom infrastructure and practice management solutions that are exercising management teams, according to our research.

It’s certainly the case that your IT must support your business in the delivery of excellence to clients.  If your systems don't match up, the client experience is likely to be damaged.

Using technology to achieve efficiencies and reduce costs has massive potential for law firms and I anticipate they will be making much more of this in future. 

Similarly, there are risk and compliance advantages.  An Information Technology plan is an essential part of our required ISO standard, the LawNet Quality System, and similarly on the Lexcel joint accreditation route we offer, but that’s a minimum requirement for any firm worth its salt these days.  Any decent system will make it easier to evidence compliance; and intranets make it easier to circulate policies and procedures to keep staff up to date and properly briefed.

Many of the resources and services we provide to LawNet member firms are online or IT based – whether it’s webcast training for professional development; our portal for risk management processes; or serviced offerings for document archiving, online precedents, case law and marketing communication software. 

My job involves a degree of second-guessing to develop new services that will be ready and in place when our firms realise they need them, but we also regularly research with members to better understand their challenges.  

We usually drill down to the most relevant contacts through our 28 specialist groups, which are dedicated to sharing inter-firm information on both professional and practice issues.  These include a practice management and IT group, which we canvassed recently to identify common themes. 

Infrastructure

In terms of physical equipment, a number of our firms have made the move to cloud solutions and will be sharing their experiences at our next practice management IT day, although the majority in our survey sample were fairly evenly split in their choice of virtualised or local servers, with software provided on a local PC or through their own server. 

For  Martyn Bateman, practice manager at Breeze & Wyles in Hertfordshire, the last year has seen the virtualisation of user desktops with thin client desktop terminals linked to a main server.  He said: “This is ensuring consistent functionality across the firm, has much reduced our help desk time and is proving more efficient.”

At Harvey Ingram - recently merged with Borneos to create a £20m firm with 350 staff operating across the Midlands and Home Counties - integration and consolidation of systems from the two firms has been the main focus for the past year.  According to Tim Percival, business development director, IT has to be at the heart of the firm’s strategy:  “Growth, different sites, consolidation - all factors that cry out for IT solutions and inevitably much of our focus has been internal over the last 12 months.  The quality and speed of inter-office connections was a crucial factor, but most important was the recognition that IT is crucial to integrating the businesses and an appropriate level of investment is essential.” 

The firm has undertaken a penetrating review which has helped them to set out a route map for the next 18 months, and will completely refresh the infrastructure with new switches, pipes and server provision.  Tim added: “Our issues are the same as smaller firms within LawNet, albeit ours may be a little more complex because of our size and geographic coverage.  We all need a robust, secure system which can cope with the future commoditisation of legal services, good client services, and connections into social media and the outside world.”

At Mogers in Bath, managing partner Steven Treharne has gone for virtual servers.  “If we were bigger or smaller, cloud solutions would have been a cost-effective option. Instead, we’ve taken a five to seven year approach - our new servers will work for us in that timeframe, after that we can probably go for cheaper options which will suit the business at that time.”

Mobile working

Also on the agenda at Mogers is a move to mobile working, with laptops that can be docked throughout the building, taking the shift away from dedicated desks and fixed PC’s, in a move that’s intended to enable better use of physical space as the firm grows.

In the open plan, single floor offices of George Davis in Manchester, the shift has already taken place.  The firm is operating on a considerably reduced floor space with its customer-focussed team approach.  Making the shift from traditional department divisions has led to a bench seat working environment – a version of ‘hot desking’ – with a communal approach to computer equipment.  The firm reports a huge boost to productivity since the changes, with billings up 17% after nine months, compared with the previous year. 

These shifts are being reflected in firms across LawNet, although change is at an early stage according to our research, which shows that only 15% of fee earners are using laptops, and the figures is almost non-existent for support functions.    Similarly, in terms of remote working there is a huge variety in attitudes.  In our research, the number of staff enabled for remote working ranged from 100% to just 1%.

Software

When we asked our firms how they are putting this hardware to work, customer-focussed case management and practice management systems were high on the agenda.

In today’s market, there are many high performance, integrated all-in-one solutions for practice, case and customer relationship management as such systems have shifted from the specialist sphere to become an essential part of the overall business strategy, for our firms at least.  They can see that it’s a way of putting the client at the centre of things to ensure a consistently high quality experience.   

At Harvey Ingram, they are about to implement a new practice and case  management system to provide a unified system across their sites.  “The final decision has yet to be made, but the most important thing is the lawyer interface and providing a familiar desktop to ease the transition,” says Tim Percival, “Also, we will look at the business processes such as expenses recording and time billing, to see how we can re-engineer them.  There’s no sense in simply replicating old practices.  It’s an opportunity to improve all round.”

But there’s a word of warning for those on the path to change from Mogers, having introduced a similar system in recent months.  Says Treharne:  “The financial investment is one small part.  What we underestimated was the time we had to invest to get a system that truly satisfied our ambitions.  It’s been tough, but now we have the right platform for the future, including our next step of going paperless.”

The paperless office is already well established at Fidler & Pepper in the East Midlands, where managing partner Mark Slade is also an accomplished software designer.  One of the first firms in the country to embrace online solutions, they introduced a fully functioning online case management back in 1998 and have significantly updated since.  According to Mark Slade, it’s been a game changer.  “These IT developments have taken us from our roots, as a traditional high street firm, to become a bigger player, playing quite a different game.” 

Web developments

Such innovations can indeed be a major differentiator in the online experience for customers, as this sphere of interaction becomes increasingly important.  Gone are the days when you put a passive ‘who we are’ website online and promptly forgot about it.  For every firm, it’s about how they can set themselves apart through a customer-focussed online presence. 

At Vanderpump  & Sykes in North London, their analytics showed that page views were increasingly being made on smartphones, so they developed a mobile version of the site, with large buttons, less text and simplified navigation.

For Mogers in Bath, their web presence has taken them into international markets, with a specialist expat offering, and they recently launched an iPhone App for employment law updates.  But for managing partner Steven Treharne, what is most important is fronting the website with the real people that make up the firm.  “We focus on relationship-driven advice and for our model to be successful post-LSA, we must have excellent people and they have to be front of house.  Relationships are made ‘person to person’ and our website does not use clichéd photo stock images for that reason.”

Keeping things fresh is also vital.  North West firm Cullimore Dutton totally restructured their web site last year with an improved content management interface to allow easier news updating and other content and have seen a boost in their Google search rankings as a result. 

The firm is also making use of the Certainty wills register, one of LawNet’s package of online outsourced services to improve customer interaction.  James Goddard, associate with Cullimore Dutton said:  “This is a great opportunity to reach out to potential clients and a strong marketing opportunity with our existing client base, to offer the new service and ensure that they are up to date with their own wills.”

Online legal services

The delivery of online legal services is certainly growing, but the picture is still taking shape. It’s over a year since we signed an agreement with Direct Law’s Epoq service to offer their online drafting solutions to our member firms.  At Mogers, the Epoq product is being considered as an internal resource, to enable more junior staff to follow a script.  As Treharne says:  “We can’t directly compete with the huge commoditised firms that are coming, nor do we want to.  We’re a mid market firm and need to be focussed and play to our strengths, but we have to be conscious of the cost of production”

Elsewhere, other firms such as Breeze & Wyles are seeing good results and are planning to use the Epoq products online as a direct service for clients.  Said Martyn Bateman:  “We have been working on improving our website functionality for clients, such as the ability to complete wills and contracts directly through the website.  A secure verification system is next, so that clients can access more of their data online.”  Others are developing their own bespoke solutions.  Harvey Ingram has devised a range of online products with added-value customer services wrapped around them, including a telephone helpline service.  The firm reports good results for its most recent online employer product, which has attracted a number of interesting new clients.

Electronic CRM

The other important focus reported by firms is in customer communications – including email marketing – as they recognise the clear marketing advantages delivered by more sophisticated database content, as well as the right delivery solution.  

Breeze & Wyles are looking at how to improve client communications with a news distribution system that links directly to the contact database.   Nicholsons are weighing up the options for a CRM add-on for marketing communications, and at Mogers, the marketing plan for the coming year includes a bigger role for social networking. 

“We tinker currently,” says Treharne.  “We are looking at how customers want us to communicate with them.  That may mean more email marketing, but we need to clean our data first, segment properly and fill in the gaps. It’s a big opportunity, but internal efficiencies need to drive developments, to give reliable data over time.”  

Back at LawNet head office, an improved online presence is top of my list too.  We are approaching the completion of a new internal network communications solution.  It is effectively a country-wide intranet and will enable us to deliver training and document sharing, as well as the growing array of risk management tools we are developing for members.  It will also extend the LawNet community online and it is a big project for us.

Alongside, I’m developing other services which I hope will helps firms to keep pace in the fast-shifting legal sector.  These include serviced client satisfaction and performance benchmarking, and an online Learning Management System - something we hope to offer to enhance staff retention, training and compliance.

Whatever comes next, information technology looks set to be high on everyone’s agenda.  As Harvey Ingram say: “Our route map equates to a significant investment for us over the next 18 months, but we’re confident we will see the right return.”

Edward O’Rourke, Corporate & Commercial Partner, Ashton KCJ

Edward is the Head of the Corporate & Commercial Team. He is an experienced panel lawyer, principally acting on behalf of global banks and has also acted for both the region's largest businesses and small start-ups. Edward's experience of commercial contracts includes agency agreements, franchise operations, distribution agreements, joint venture relationships and a wide range of trading terms and conditions.

He can also advise directors and shareholders on their rights and duties and dealing with succession planning. He is Chairman of the Company Commercial Committee of national law group LawNet.

How would others describe you in three words?
Stupid adrenalin junkie.

What has been your best professional moment to date?
Building a team.

What has been your worst/most embarrassing professional moment to date?
As a trainee leaving client files on the roof of a car and driving off (files were retrieved complete with tyre marks).

Tell us about one surprising thing you’ve learned since becoming Partner?
Aconcagua is the highest mountain outside of the Himalayas.

If you hadn't chosen Law, what do you think you'd be doing with your life?
Mountain rescue.

If we looked in your desk’s top drawer, what would we find?
Lunch.

At the heart of all of your marketing activity is your prospect list. Once you’ve decided who you’re going to target with what, it is vitally important that the ‘who’ is very clearly identified in your list of prospects. Hence building, developing, nurturing and maintaining your prospect list, is crucial to the success of the business. In this article we’re going to look at how to build that prospect list from scratch.

Well, one of the many prospect list providers is a good place to start. Like most things in life, though, you need to have an idea of what you’re looking for before you start searching.

You will find that there are limits to what is available and what you can search for. The more specific you are with the people you want to target, the more difficult it will be to get hold of a list, and the more expensive it will be. For instance if you want to know which companies in the UK have an Avaya IP500 telephone system to more than 30 extensions, that’s going to be expensive, if you can find it; and if it is accurate and up to date.

There are over 3 million businesses in the UK (assuming you want to target the UK) including limited companies, PLC’s and LLP’s, sole traders and partnerships. Of those, it is reasonable to expect to create a list of, say, 10,000 – 12,000 prospects that it is worth having a meaningful conversation with about the benefits of your product or service. Clearly that number will vary considerably depending on the size of your company, who you want to target, and so on.

You need to define the sort of companies you want to target, in what industries, in what geographies, etc. You also want to decide who, by job title, you want to target within those companies.

You will find that you can search for prospects by various factors such as company turnover, employee numbers, number of sites, etc. So you’ll need to use these types of parameters to search for the prospect you want to target.

Have a chat to some of the list providers and they can give you more detail on what’s available and how to approach the task of buying a list. Once you decide what you want, expect to pay something like 20 pence a record for company name, address, telephone number and decision maker name. Talk to companies like Corpdata and Marketingfile.com and they can give you a good steer.

Have a great marketing and selling day!

Another day, another headline announcing change and reform. The legal profession and the courts service are changing quicker than a model at London Fashion Week. There are some firms jogging ahead of the competition in the ABS marathon. Will they triumph? What of those firms bringing up the rear - will they meet with disaster? Or, as Kipling implored, would we all do well to treat these imposters of triumph and disaster just the same.

The ABS starting gun fired on 3 January: first results of the 96 front-runners are due at the end of February. As Liverpool firm, Silverbeck Rymer, prepares, subject to SRA approval, to become the first law firm to be acquired by a listed company, Quindell Portfolio, at a price tag of almost £20m, it seems legitimate to ask what may be the fate of other firms exhausted by or excluded from the process or voluntarily still in the changing rooms? Will they fall by the wayside or be found in a pleasant location alongside the track toasting their prescience in keeping out of the whole ABS roadshow?

Already there is some quibbling that too much convenience can be a bad thing: Mobile Doctors, a medical reporting agency, has also been bought by Quindell - a very useful acquisition for a personal injury business to have on hand. No doubt the in-house arrangements will also have the fortuitous outcome that a 360-degree service can be provided without worrying about referral fees - rather a neat side-stepping manoeuvre  despite David Cameron’s determination at the Insurance Summit recently to crack the whip over the cosy practices so heavily criticised by the Transport Select Committee’s December report and which looks likely to culminate in legislative action to curb not just referral fees but also the whiplash claims industry as a whole.

But aside from the circus of arguments swirling around the manufacture and processing of personal injury claims, what will be the practical effect upon smaller firms of the traders coming over the hill touting non-reserved legal activities?  How can they compete with the  ABS entities where the customer (nb: not client) is lured by expensive advertisements to be swallowed whole by the consumer brand experience and which, a cynic would say, sells you things you didn’t even know you wanted?

New business models (stock-market flotation, franchises, direct access to barristers and other professionals of other disciplines, new technology and influence by non-UK businesses) promising customer focus, different costing, new brands, innovation and service delivery. This rosy picture may look good to browsing customers but what about inside the business? Might the employees have a different view of the newly imposed corporate structure and corporate way of doing things? Will “shareholder” come to have the same dignified ring and status as “partner” or must people simply adjust to the brave new world, embrace their new corporate identity and bid farewell to the old hierarchical structures? If they don’t like it, they can always move - but where to? In the futuristic but realistic world of diminishing returns heralded not just by Jackson but the likely outcome of the government’s current Consultation on “Solving Claims in the County Courts”, where will disgruntled litigation lawyers find haven?

As some firms are cherry-picked for their bounteous offerings, as in the case of Silverbeck Rymer, what of other stalwarts of the profession who have for so many years diligently but modestly served their clients within a local area? Will they be able to survive the relentless commoditization of personal injury claims? Will the giants of service industry triumph over the upholding of service in a personable, professional, client-friendly practice? I opened with a reference to fashion week. At a time when homogeneity is “in” and everyone and everything has to look the same, is there any point in solicitors taking a stand against wearing the “Emperor’s New Clothes”? Even Vivienne Westwood, the doyenne of modern fashion, has bemoaned our “ugly”, clone-like culture. And so for the law, might there be a flicker of recognition that being unique, having an individual and distinctive identity built upon a professional and personal style, is in itself of value when cost, cost, cost is all we hear about?

Probably not. With the increasing amount of regulation for solicitors and planned changes for fixed fees in personal injury work, firms will not be able to compete on costs in the personal injury sector of the market where price determines placement of the work. Financially, it will become impossible to run a business. With Jackson’s reforms kicking in and the government reining in, we can still hope that all businesses, no matter their size, will offer a gold standard service of professional integrity and good communication.

Solicitors will hope that that service will be shown to be best rendered by qualified legal staff giving proper legal advice and that they will win out over the behemoths that threaten to overshadow the profession. But enduring traits of quality, individuality and value for money rather than cost, may have had their day as, in this marathon of change, endurance is not the key to winning. Change, reform, innovation and evolution is in - all with a customer-facing smile of course!

Compliance and risk management is a huge challenge for all firms. LawNet has a strong background of helping its members achieve and maintain excellence in this area. Jeanette Lucy, LawNet’s Director of Learning & Development outlines some of the upcoming changes to the support packages offered by the network and how non-member firms will be able to benefit from some of this knowledge and support too.

The LawNet Quality Standard

LawNet will launch its new combined Quality Standard at the end of February. A first for the sector, this new Standard will uniquely incorporate all the elements of Lexcel and the Outcomes from the SRA’s Code of Conduct 2011, together with our ISO 9001:2008 requirements.

All LawNet firms must achieve and maintain the LawNet Quality Standard in order to secure their position as members of the network. This update to the standard enables us to offer further support to our members in meeting the additional compliance requirements facing the profession.

LawNet firms can now also achieve Lexcel accreditation through the network at a significantly reduced price making us the only network to offer dual accreditation to its firms. 

 

Toolkits for compliance

In addition to the Standard, firms will be provided with a toolkit to assist in getting the correct documentation in place and essential audit checklists which will enable the firms to self-assess compliance prior to the external audit.

 

CoLPs and CoFAs training & ongoing support

The first of our 30+ Spring training events was a day for potential CoLPs and CoFAs led by compliance expert Tracey Calvert.  It was a lively and interesting event with great debate. The “Scary but good” feedback received sums up the feelings of many delegates.

The good practice information captured at the event was rated as highly valuable by attendees and will be shared with all LawNet members. This information will shortly be available for non-members too. If you’re interested in receiving a copy please contact jlucy@lawnet.co.uk

We will be repeating this event and opening it up to non-members too. If you’d like to receive more information please contact jlucy@lawnet.co.uk.

To support those CoLPs and CoFAs face the unknown, LawNet has launched a new best practice group, which will include a forum for asking questions and sharing ideas. 

Our full calendar of spring training includes over 30 CPD events in technical law, business development and strategic management. All LawNet’s core training is free of charge to members.

 

QBE, QRisk & LawNet

QBE, the primary insurer for the LawNet group P.I.I. scheme, is launching a new online portal – QRisk, to help firms manage risk more proactively. An on-line risk assessment tool coupled with on-line precedents will enable firms to benchmark performance against essential risk criteria, develop effective risk control solutions, monitor and track risk improvement status and receive recommendations for improvements. LawNet firms will help QBE to test the platform.

Exclusive to LawNet members, QBE will also be giving free access to a range of Vinci Works e-learning anti-money laundering and risk management products delivered via a bespoke Learning Management System.

For more information about this or any of the risk management and compliance support available through LawNet please contact Jeanette Lucy on 01926 886990 or email jlucy@lawnet.co.uk.

Martyn has been Practice Manager at Breeze and Wyles Solicitors LLP since the start of 2000 and has overseen the substantial growth of the firm since then. Martyn’s responsibilities range from planning for the future of the business to day-to-day administration. He is the Head of the Administration Department which deals with the Firm’s premises, people, IT systems and accounts; he is also the Firm’s Money Laundering Reporting Officer.

 

 

 

 

How would others describe you in three words?
I asked some others and quite a few 'three worders' came back.  Of the printable ones some made me feel quite humble.  The one I preferred - and would like to live up to - was 'Leads by example'

 

What has been your best professional moment to date?
When I worked as the listing officer at Birmingham Crown Court, I had listed a serious case when all of the witnesses were available but leading Counsel for the defence was due to appear in another matter at the same time and wasn't therefore available.  Counsel applied to the Judge to have the matter removed from the list on the basis that the defendant was entitled to Counsel of his choice.

I was in Court to hear what was said and my heart sank when I heard the Judge say "Yes Mr XXXX, I agree that your client is entitled to Counsel of his choice" but I could barely suppress a giggle when he added "but not necessarily of his first choice!" and refused the application - Don't you just love High Court Judges?

Probably the best of all is the way that Breeze & Wyles has developed during the time that I have been here. It's great to see how the firm has changed and developed over the years, and I would like to think that I have had something to do with that.

 

What has been your worst/most embarrassing professional moment to date?
Having to shrink the size of the firm during the recession.  We had to lose some good people.  There were many who helped out by agreeing to work shorter hours so that we were able to retain most of the excellent talent that we have, but it wasn't pleasant for a while.

Thank goodness that the worst seems to be over and we can get on with running a successful business again.  I am looking forward over the next year to significantly improving the service that we give to our clients.

 

Tell us about one surprising thing you’ve learned since becoming Practice Manager?
That my ambitions at school didn't include being appointed as a Money Laundering Reporting Officer and that influencing Partners is a bit like juggling with Jelly (oops, that's two!)

 

If you hadn't chosen Law, what do you think you'd be doing with your life?
I would like to train as a professional Mountain Guide. The call of the mountains is strong and it would be great to pass on a little of my enthusiasm and see others enjoying the mountains as much as I do.

 

If we looked in your desk’s top drawer, what would we find?
I've just looked and it's pretty boring - just office stationery. There is a dictionary and a Thesaurus though.

 

 

Tracey Calvert is a highly experienced regulatory compliance specialist with extensive knowledge of legal ethics, professional conduct, financial services and anti-money laundering regulation. She has been the owner and director of Oakalls Consultancy Limited since 2009.

 

 

 

A senior SRA executive recently described the legal landscape in Shakespearian terms as a “brave new world”.  To add a touch of realism I’d rely on Darwin’s observation and say that it is not the strongest of the species  in this new world that will survive,  but the ones who are most responsive to change.

Head in the sand, and an attitude that it will all go away, is not an option whereas a little bit of navel- gazing will do wonders at this moment in time.

It is true that times are changing. It’s a different and more competitive marketplace now. The SRA has started to accept applications from prospective Alternative Business Structures (not Tesco, but the Co-Op and DAS are amongst the first applicants) and it’s likely that these new boys will be launching their own legal services models in the next few months. The SRA has also changed its approach to regulation with the launch of a new Handbook last year. It’s not just any old rule book (in fact it’s not all rules) but is instead the regulator’s toolkit with which to introduce outcomes-focused regulation (OFR) and risk-based regulation.  It also enables the SRA to complete its realignment as an entity-based regulator able to consider everyone working within a law firm and ensure that firms focus on effective management and risk management.

Firms should already  be considering their existing ways of working and asking themselves whether they are fit for purpose in this new world. Firms with quality standards, such as ISO9001 and Lexcel, have a good foundation but should not be complacent. The SRA has warned against firms falling into “unthinking compliance” or “compliance painting by numbers”. Instead, firms must consider what makes them unique – their business model, clients, work – and plan accordingly.

And this revolution is on-going. The next step is the appointment of compliance officers – one for legal practice (your COLP) and one for finance and administration (your COFA). Firms need to notify the SRA of their nominees by 31 March 2012 and appointments will be confirmed by 31 October 2012. Again, the SRA has issued warnings. They say that these roles are essential for the successful operation of OFR and that they will want to see officers with “sufficient resources, seniority and unambiguous championing from those running the firm….firms that fail to do this will be running a serious regulatory risk”.

So the message is clear: a fuss-free relationship with the regulator requires some regulatory navel- gazing to ensure that you have demonstrable systems in place to reflect and manage your regulatory risks. Careful consideration must be given to your compliance officer appointments. They shouldn’t be there in name only but should be playing a full and well-supported role in your regulatory functions.    If you haven’t started to plan for this, time is of the essence and it is time well-spent. The legal world is changing and only those who make changes will survive.

In the Chair this week features Paul Lowe, Operations Director of Darbys Solicitors LLP, a 21 partner firm in Oxford (Thame and Manchester).  Paul has been with Darbys for 30 plus years and is also the Chairman of the highly prestigious Oxfordshire Business Awards. Paul has been Chair of the LawNet Practice Management group for 8 years.

He loves all sport, particularly football and cricket. He has been a supporter of Oxford United for the last 40 years and is also a former director of Oxford United.

How would others describe you in three words?
Practical, willing and fair.

What has been your best professional moment to date?
Appearing at the European Court of Human Rights - twice. The first time was in the usual Chamber before 7 Judges and the second in the Grand Chamber before 17 Judges.

What has been your worst/most embarrassing professional moment to date?
Losing in the House of Lords 5-0 and the Grand Chamber of the European Court 10-7. On both occasions I was more upset /devastated than the client.

Tell us about one surprising thing you’ve learned since becoming Director of Operations?  
The variety of the job. No one day is the same.

If you hadn't chosen Law, what do you think you'd be doing with your life?
I would have loved to have been a professional footballer but was never good enough. I love sport particularly football and cricket, so some sort of sports commentator would have been great.

If we looked in your desk’s top drawer, what would we find?
Too many things to mention. I am a hoarder and my top drawer is symptomatic of this bad habit.

Yep, Christmas is just around the corner.  I don't know about you but it seems a bit weird thinking about Christmas or doing much present shopping before 1^st December at least!

However, some things take a bit more planning (and no, I don't just mean the staff party….you are having a staff party aren't you?).

Right now, there is someone in your firm fighting with the "old enemy" (no, not the Scots) the Christmas card list.  I know what you're thinking, now we're living in the digital age surely that's easier, no more deciding who signs which cards, getting them printed in time, making sure there are enough stamps etc.  Surely it's just upload a list of email addresses and press send.

Well, that's partly true, but you still have to pick out the design of an e-card.  You still have to "get" the list of email addresses, and HOW complicated can that be.  Well in speaking with my clients recently, for some of them it's just as complicated as it's always been.  If you are lucky you have an Excel file,  if not then it's clients in your PMS, referrers in Excel and everyone else in Outlook address books.  We had a serious discussion with one firm back in the autumn about bringing in SugarCRM just to manage their Christmas card list….thank god it never happened.

However you do build your list, there are many more things you can do than just send an e-card.  Here are some ideas we are working on with our clients this year :-

• Christmasify your website - snow on your logo, icicles from your logo, Santa hats on staff, seasonal images in your banner.  There are loads of ideas that can be implemented with a bit of design flair.  We usually only do this in the last week before the 25^th and take it down as soon as everyone is back at work.
• Animated cards - becoming more popular even with conservative law firms
• Dancing scrooge - you know the one, where you upload someone's photo and send them a link.  Let's not get carried away, even if you did have the appetite for this, it's VERY expensive to create these kinds of animations.
• Personalised cards - check out what you can do at Moonpig.com
• Santa cartoons - made using Xtranormal, check out a work-in-progress at www.xtranormal.com/watch/12551518/suing-santa-2

Whatever you do, this is the one time of year where you can show the playful side of your firm….you do have one don't you?

For some visual samples of the ideas about, download the PDF linked from the Conscious website.

 

Ray Crudgington is managing partner of LawNet’s newest member firm, Grant Saw LLP in south east London – the fifth to join in the past 12 months.

 Employing 20 lawyers and with five partners, Grant Saw provides legal services to a private and corporate customer base across south east London and the Docklands and has ambitions to significantly increase its share of commercial work.

Ray explains why they chose to join LawNet:

“Now seemed the right time to join LawNet for us.  We’ve got serious ambitions to grow the firm and want to significantly increase our share of commercial work.   By joining LawNet we see it as offering us an opportunity to grow, by learning from other larger firms, sharing resources and cutting our internal costs through group discounted services.

Over the last few years we have made a concerted effort to expand.  We moved into some modern offices in 2003, got our first web site running in 2005 and then secured Lexcel in 2007.  We did all that and then, like most of the sector, went into recession survival mode for a while.

But then you look around and see the changes coming in around ABS and everything that we’re all contending with and we started thinking about how strategic partnerships might provide value.  We want to ramp up on both contentious and non contentious commercial work, and particularly company commercial, and need to find the route to achieve that.

We had had some discussions with LawNet once before, but we were in the process of merging with another firm and it didn’t feel the right time.  We were in a state of change, not sure what we’d look like at the other end and certainly a smaller player by comparison with others in the network.

We investigated other networks and collaborative initiatives, and trialled one for a year to see how it might help our ambitions.  In the end we reached the conclusion that it wasn’t going to be right for us.

So that’s when we came back to talk to LawNet.  There are larger firms than us in the network, and that matches our aspirations.  Seeing what we get, we were really impressed.

Lawnet appears to be lawyer driven.  We like the not-for-profit model and the fact that any surplus gets ploughed back into member services.   The collective bargaining power brings real cost benefits; and these are all firms that we wish to be associated with.

We want to be around bigger firms to learn from them.  There’s a risk in being one of the larger fish in your own pond, that you start thinking the others on your patch are your competition, but you need to have a bigger picture and look at what is being done at the level where you are really competing.

We are very committed to best practice and think it is vital for our future success.  Customer service is important – if we do things well, the client will see the benefit.  But we need to explore new ways of doing things and that’s where it becomes important to speak with other law firms and other lawyers in a non competing environment.   The chance to do that is limited elsewhere.

We want to share resources and grow.   That’s what we’re looking to achieve by being part of LawNet."

More about the author:

Ray Crudgington: Managing Partner and Head of Commercial & Probate Departments at LawNet member firm Grant Saw LLP.  Ray qualified as a solicitor in 1991 after graduating from Leicester University and training with a major City firm. Since qualifying he has dealt mainly with company/commercial work and commercial property. He joined Grant Saw at the end of 1997 following several years with a Central London firm and is the head of the firm's commercial and probate departments. Ray is the Honorary Solicitor for the South East London Chamber of Commerce and a member of The Law Management Section of The Law Society.

This article first appeared in the November edition of Professional Marketing Magazine. View the original article here~ Client Engagement_PM Magazine. For further details please go to www.pmforum.co.uk

Is client engagement at the heart of your firm’s strategy? Perhaps it should be. Helen Hamilton-Shaw, director of services at LawNet, the national network of mid market law firms, explores why LawNet firms are bringing engagement higher up the agenda.

Everyone is talking about client engagement - it’s one of the current buzzwords of the profession.  But other sectors have been taking engagement seriously for a long time. Client or customer engagement first entered the rhetoric in the early 00’s and many successful global businesses now focus much of their efforts on developing and monitoring engagement levels. LawNet member firms are increasingly pushing the topic up their agendas; and as a members-owned network, engagement of our members is one of my key focuses as well. It seems we are all chasing the holy grail of actively engaged clients!

 
WHAT IS IT?

Definitions for the term ‘engagement’ are still evolving and range from simple marketing, loyalty and satisfaction schemes to more strategic approaches, which put the client at the heart of the company or firm, enabling the development of deeper relationships and experiences. In a law firm context, it is about firms looking holistically at the interactions they have with their clients and shifting the focus away from the historical, transactional nature of individual matters, towards building long term beneficial client relationships. It’s about looking at the lifetime value of that client to your firm.

WHY SHOULD I CARE?

Analysts at Forrester published a report recently declaring that we had now entered ‘The Age of the Customer’ which is fundamentally shifting the competitive framework of every industry. Primacy in the traditional competitive arenas of manufacturing capabilities, distribution strength and knowledge superiority are no longer enough to secure success.  Instead in this new age, “the only sustainable competitive advantage is knowledge and engagement with customers”.  The legal profession will not be immune to this shift. Your clients are somebody else’s customers and they will come to expect the same level of service and relationship from their professional advisor as they do from other providers. 

In addition to this global shift, the legal profession itself is in a period of dramatic change with increased pressure and challenges ahead. Whilst the official introduction of ABS’s might still be around the corner, other changes are happening already and firms cannot afford to be complacent. The market for mid-tier law firms is being squeezed at both ends and is more competitive than ever. In these conditions staying close to your clients can be an effective defensive strategy.  As Lindsey Farrelly, solicitor and business development manager at LawNet firm, George Davies in Manchester says, “There is more competition than ever in the mid tier. We need to keep close to our clients and turn them into lifetime customers. Client engagement is a way to differentiate ourselves from our competitors”.

The business case for investing in a client engagement strategy is pretty compelling. According to international research company Gallup, organisations which excel at engagement outperform their competitors by 26% in gross margin and 85% in sales growth.  In a market where the competition for clients and fees is ever increasing it’s hard to ignore statistics like that.

WHERE IS THE VALUE?

So  how do engaged clients differ from unengaged clients? The theoretical difference is clear, as outlined in Figure 1 describing the four categories of client engagement as defined by Gallup. What does this mean in practice?

Feedback from LawNet member firms suggests that they see a clear benefit in engaging clients through higher retention rates and ultimately increased fees.

As Farrelly explains:  “If you employ a transactional focus with a client, then that’s the kind of relationship you get back from them and you’re unlikely to hear from them again.  Over 60% of the files we open are for existing clients. We focus our energies on building relationships with these clients so they come to see us as a “collaborative partner” as opposed to just another supplier. These clients then also recommend us to others.”

By truly engaging with clients you develop more meaningful relationships which can be beneficial for everyone. “Engaged clients,” according to Brendan O’Brien, partner at Hertfordshire based LawNet member Breeze & Wyles, “are happy clients who wants to receive your advice and assistance.  They are also more likely to appreciate the true value of your advice.”

The strategic goal of many firms embracing engagement is to reach the sought after status of ‘trusted advisor’.  As Farrelly says: “Once you engage with clients, you are able to learn more about their business and anticipate their needs.”

HOW TO DO IT

A survey conducted in 2010 by agency Claydon Heeley asked individuals exactly how brands could build better relationships with them. The overwhelming answer was that they should “Listen to what customers have to say – and act on it.”

This is exactly the approach being taken by LawNet members IBB Solicitors, a 30 partner firm in West London. “Engaging clients is something a lot of firms talk about, but the phrase ‘client-focused’ has become almost banal. It’s easy to say, but not easy to convince clients that you deliver,” says Abby Winkworth, Partner, Marketing & Business Development.

“IBB has introduced a range of activities to put the client at the centre of everything we do. This includes dedicated client partners, a focused client relationship review programme for our top clients, client engagement surveys and six monthly client questionnaires. Overarching all this activity is a drive to focus on really listening to our clients. But more than just listening, it has to be active listening. There’s no point gathering all that information if you do nothing with it. So as actions come out of those conversations, we act on them and most importantly once we’ve made changes we then tell the client that we’ve done what they asked.

“One of the most controversial moves was to make one person truly responsible for the client internally. This is more than just an administration role collating information from satisfaction surveys. This person has authority to raise issues at team meetings and push for changes and improvements. They are the voice of the client, and they get listened to.”

This all represents a shift in the focus of the firm into the realms of engagement and is about having real dialogues with clients, putting their needs at the top of the firm’s agenda.

And the result of this commitment?  “It’s early days for some of these activities,” says Winkworth, “but the indications are that clients really value the feeling of greater depth in our relationship as a direct result of our engagement strategies, which is helping us to achieve our goal of reaching ‘trusted advisor’ status.

“We’re constantly tracking performance  across the firm and use that data to drive improvements in the way we run our business. We’re also gathering plenty of anecdotal evidence to support the return on our investment, including work generation across departments and clients.”

Listening and service are key. As IBB say, it’s not enough to just ask “is everything all right?” They are continually asking “is there anything more I can do for you?” Whilst it might seem a subtle change, it’s a fundamental shift in approaching client relationships.

East Anglian LawNet firm, Kester Cunningham John has introduced a firm wide project “Exceptional Client Experience” to prioritise client engagement. For Hannah Rutterford, partner, treating clients as individuals is a fundamental and never assuming you know what the client wants ensures you communicate and listen throughout: “Involving your client at every step is crucial to ensuring you are constantly meeting their needs and providing a ‘custom-made’ service, therefore keeping you ahead of your competitors.

 “An engaged client is one who is confident they have been listened to, is involved and informed throughout the process, is at the heart of the process and whose aims and achievements have been met no matter how many times they may have changed on the way. “

The client experience is central to improving client engagement. Think about all the touch points you have with clients. What is their experience like at each point? How can it be improved?  The client experience needs to pervade the firm. An internal client champion can be a great way of ensuring that the client can be “heard” internally.

To achieve client engagement you need client understanding at the core. You can’t possibly hope to build a meaningful relationship with your clients if you don’t know them.  The recent research by Managing Partner Forum found that having an in-depth knowledge of their business, was the most highly rated factor underpinning deep relationships for clients.

Firms could learn much from other sectors. For David Gilroy, sales & marketing director at Conscious Solutions, who work extensively with customers in professional services, client engagement means staying close to your clients and developing a two-way conversation with them.  “Key Account Management programmes, client surveys, client research, asking them what they want are all important to building deep relationships.  For example, in our world we ask our clients how often they want account reviews; some want monthly, some quarterly, but the key is that we actually ask.”

CONTINUAL IMPROVEMENT

 If you can’t measure something then you can’t improve performance, so it’s important to track engagement activities across the firm. Online that might include clicks, open rates, interactions, impressions, retweets etc.  Offline; measure referrals, attendances at events, cross-selling and files opened as well as qualitative feedback received through meetings, and individual conversations.  

DELIVERING VALUE

In order to deliver value to your firm you need to take a strategic approach to your engagement activities ensuring you really focus on the people you want to engage with. Many firms have had to overcome the usual internal challenges related to introducing change and new ways of working. But the traditional view that work will just arrive through the door is simply not true in the increasingly competitive landscape. And with even greater change and competition on the horizon, engagement and developing valued relationships with your clients is something that cannot be ignored.

 

Ian Curtis is the Managing and Senior Partner of Warner Goodman LLP, one of the largest firms of solicitors in the South East, which has been in practice for over 150 years. 

Ian has spent his entire legal career with Warner Goodman, believes fervently in involving staff at all levels in the shaping of the firm’s future.  Ian thinks that if you snapped him in half, you’d read Warner Goodman, going through him like a stick of rock.   He loves all things cricket

 

How would others describe you in three words?
I have taken input from those who know me better than myself!  The suggested words are fair, positive and fun.  Even though we all know the last few years have been difficult I have always tried, wherever possible, to think positively and inject humour where I can.

What has been your best professional moment to date?
I guess it was probably when I was elected as the firm's full time Managing Partner - 20 years ago.  I was only 38 years of age at the time. The election in theory was by secret ballot but I have always suspected there was a stitch up!  Little did I know I would still be in the post 20 years on!

What has been your worst/most embarrassing professional moment to date?
The worst moment has to be the handling of redundancies arising out of the recession.  We had to lose some really good and loyal people including a Conveyancer who had given the firm 58 years of service - and who had hoped to break the firm's record of 66 years service!  The silver lining to that cloud is that many of those who left still keep in regular contact with the firm - and we have even been able to re-recruit some of them.

Tell us about one surprising thing you’ve learned since becoming Senior/Managing Partner?
Although in many respects this is a lonely job I have been surprised at how willing my counterparts (in other firms both inside and outside of LawNet) have been to discuss common problems with me.

If you hadn't chosen Law, what do you think you'd be doing with your life?
In my dreams I would have had a successful career playing football for Manchester United and England - in reality I probably would have become a journalist.  If I had done, and in view of the recent phone hacking scandal, I would have chosen one of the few professions which is even less popular than the one I chose!

If we looked in your desk’s top drawer, what would we find?
Do not go there.  It can best be described as a desk version of an attic - full of stuff which I think I might use one day but actually never will.

See coverage of this story on the Legal Futures website.  Click here.

The changing legal services market offers big opportunities to mid size firms, according to managing and senior partners attending this year’s LawNet conference.

But the firms also said that if they were to benefit from the opportunities, they needed to develop a stronger strategy, must look at restructuring and would need to become more specialist.

Over 60% of the firms believe they need to be at least a third bigger, with a further 24% looking towards at least a doubling  in size.

National brands, new styles of service delivery and price competition are seen as the biggest threats in the market.

And as the first reports reach the market of equity funding deals for legal firms, including the majority shareholding taken in the QualitySolicitors brand, almost 60% of LawNet firms said they would accept such non lawyer equity investment.   And when asked what they would do with a £250,000 cash injection, the firms would be most likely to invest the money in brand development and business development, closely followed by hiring a professional CEO or other professional managers.

All the feedback from firms came through on the spot questions posed by speakers Nick Jarrett-Kerr and George Bull  at the conference, tackling a range of key strategy issues, with instant feedback from the floor using audience response keypads.

The full list of topics surveyed and the responses:  

Does your firm need to become more specialist to win higher value work in future?
Hardly at all, we have about the right mix	13%
Nearly there just honing skills in a couple of areas	24%
Made a start, work in progress	43%
We are too generalist, all departments need to develop	20%
Does your firm need to grow over the next three to five years to remain competitive and profitable?
Hardly at all, we are just the right size	16%
At least a third bigger	59%
Double in size	15%
More than double	10%
How would you describe the level of ambition amongst your partnership group?
Highly ambitious and entrepreneurial	10%
Mainly focused on defending our current position and profitability	34%
Cautious and comfortable	4%
A complete mixture of views and levels of ambition	52%
If I were to invest £250,000 in your firm, what would you spend most of  it on?
Laterally hiring more partners	14%
Paying out non-performing partners	9%
Hiring a professional CEO or other professional managers	22%
Building IT infrastructure	16%
Developing our brand and business development	38%
Bigger offices	1%
Which one of these pressures is the greatest threat to the solicitors’ profession?
New entrants	16%
Evolving client (customer) expectations	7%
Price competition	28%
New methods of service delivery	22%
The power of brands and advertising	24%
Consolidation	3%
Do you feel your firm's strategy is adequate to meet the challenges of the new market?
Yes	40%
No	60%
Over the next 3 years, do you expect that your firm will restructure in response to the LSA?
Yes	61%
No	39%
If approached by a new investor, would your firm accept non-lawyer equity investment?
Yes	59%
No	41%
The restructuring of the legal market is going to bring big opportunities for my firm:
I agree	80%
I disagree	8%
I don’t know	6%
I don’t care, I’m going to retire	6%

Mark Hovell is Managing Partner of Manchester’s George Davies Solicitors LLP and the 2011 Winner of the LawNet Managing Partner of the Year Award.

Mark received the award for his “inspirational approach and fearless attitude to change”.  When nominating Mark, Lindsey Farrelly of George Davies said, “He brings out the best in people.  There’s a real buzz across the firm.”

Mark specializes in Sports Law, Insolvency and Commercial, as well as being a licensed Insolvency Practitioner and Certified Arbitrator.  In his spare time, he is a full time dad who goes running and plays football, rugby, racketball and golf when he gets a minute!

How would others describe you in three words?
My wife describes me as a “short fat lawyer”. The kids are worse!

What has been your best professional moment to date?
With my lawyer’s hat on, representing the Court of Arbitration for Sport at the Commonwealth Games in Delhi was an amazing experience.

What has been your worst professional moment to date?
As we, like most firms, made cuts at the start of this recession, I had to let half a dozen people go. I guess it was the reality that you’re close to all your people and that was the worst part of this role to date.

Tell us about one surprising thing you’ve learned since becoming Managing Partner?
That it’s easier to manage in a recession! When things are going well, people aren’t interested in new ideas or change; when there’s pressure on they are!

If you hadn't chosen Law, what do you think you'd be doing with your life?
I’d always wanted to be a psychiatrist (as my father was a doctor and my mother was nosey!) when finishing school, but never got the grades, so took a management degree instead. The Law came later, so guess I’d be managing somewhere else – perhaps at Manchester United after City thumped them the other day!

AND FINALLY

If we looked in your desk’s top drawer, what would we find?
Nothing – since our move to new premises, no one has their own desk, let alone their own office. You’d have to look on my ipad!

The finale of last Friday’s annual LawNet conference was the naming of the winners of this year’s LawNet Awards.  For 2011 we received many excellent entries and our congratulations to all the winners and a big thank you to all the other firms who entered.   The full story, interviews and pictures will be published here on the blog this week.

This year’s winners were:

Best use of Technology sponsored byTikitTFB
Fidler & Pepper Solicitors

Best Business Development/Marketing Initiative sponsored by thecabinetoffice
Mogers Solicitors LLP

Best Website sponsored by Conscious Solutions
Clarkson Wright & Jakes Ltd

Outstanding Client Care sponsored by Acuigen
IBB Solicitors

Managing Partner of the Year sponsored by Wilkinson Read & Partners
Mark Hovell, George Davies Solicitors LLP

Law firm of the Year sponsored by Voicepath
Buckles Solicitors LLP

Other LawNet member firms shortlisted were:

Best Technology award

• Breeze & Wyles
• George Davies

 Best Single Initiative in Business Development or Marketing

• George Davies
• Fidler & Pepper Solicitors

Best Website:

• Cullimore Dutton
• Eaton Smith
• Vanderpump & Sykes
• Commitment to Client Care : 
• Gardner Leader

Managing Partner of the Year

• Colleen Gostick of Buckles Solicitors
• Kim Carr of FBC Manby Bowdler

 Law Firm of the Year award:

• Barker Gillette
• FBC Manby Bowdler
• George Davies

Anita Wynne is a Director and Co-Founder of beststart HUMAN RESOURCES.
Her HR experience incorporates 5 years in the retail sector at Marks & Spencer, one and half years in manufacturing with GEC Marconi Avionics and 6 years in investment/ professional firms culminating in being a Vice President at JPMorgan.

Her more recent focus has allowed her to combine her broad sector experience of HR in blue chip names with knowledge of best practice in both small and large companies and issues at all levels of an organisation, including law firms.

__________________________________________________________________________

One of the greatest challenges facing Partners in law firms today appears to me to be the pressure placed upon them to be “Super Partners”.  No longer can a professional, highly technical Partner expect to be left to beaver away in a corner behind mountains of files earning large fees for the Firm.   Instead, to at minimum survive, Firms need Partners to be visionary thinkers, strategic planners, business developers, marketers, external ambassadors and people managers.  As I don’t see many partners wandering around with their underpants on the outside of their trousers, I think it is a tall order that few can live up to.  So what can firms do to help equip their existing Partners for these new demands?

Many Partners will have been made Partners because of their technical capability and most will have received little training or support in people management, business development and strategic thinking.  However, that does not mean that they do not have the potential to be good, the issue is that they are unlikely to be good at, or have the time to do, everything.  As a team of Partners, they should work as such, identifying who has an interest and a potential skill in each of the demands and then play to each one’s strengths allocating additional responsibilities along these lines.   How this works in practice will depend on the size of the Firm but it is not unreasonable to visualize a Firm where people management responsibilities are given to a number of Partners who have skills or enjoy this whilst marketing the Firm’s services and attending business development activities are carried out by others.

As these roles will be new for many, Partners should not feel that they are “too senior” for training.  We would all probably welcome someone to share our issues with, talk through solutions, offer advice and provide objective feedback and that is the type of support that can be critical in helping Partners develop.  This support can be provided by a range of professionals and can be essential in not only providing some of the knowledge but helping Partners to use their natural instincts and skills to best effect.

In my experience, however, the main preventer of Partners achieving these new roles is time or should I say the lack of it.  In many cases, they are still expected to generate the same level of fees in addition to these responsibilities.  These are usually time consuming in their own right and few Partners sit around twiddling their thumbs with copious amounts of spare time.  So without being able to create extra hours, how can this balance be addressed?  Firms should consider defining the role of the Partner and ensuring that responsibilities are divided amongst the team according to talent, this may include relooking at Partners’ fee earning targets.  Every Partner looking at how they spend their time each day can often also be enlightening - how much time is wasted through distractions, how is modern communication methods helping or hindering them?  Then tools being adopted which help Partners to delegate and use their precious time effectively.

I don’t believe that a “Super Partner” can only be found in fantasy comic books, with the rethinking of the traditional role, appropriate support and open mindedness, they could be seen soon in a Firm near you.

Anita Wynne

Beststart HUMAN RESOURCES

Rob Salisbury Senior Partner of Gamlins, North Wales

Rob Started life as an Advocate but became Senior Partner at a relatively young age and became involved in business law. He now deals with commercial and company law, especially commercial leases, planning law, partnership and shareholder agreements and all other aspects of business life.

He is a member of the Welsh CBI Committee.

What is something that not a lot of people know about you but you WISH more people COULD know?
That I’m really quite a nice chap.      

What qualities do you feel a successful Senior/Managing Partner should have?
Above all, experience.  It is irreplaceable.  Indeed experience will have taught many of us that often the best way forward is to do nothing. However, if that does not work, then act quickly and decisively.
Also make sure that you walk around the office several time a week and say hello to people and take an interest in their roles.

Tell us about one surprising thing you’ve learned since becoming Senior/Managing Partner?
How people will often do anything to avoid telling you the truth and what the real problem is – even then most staff problems are nothing to do with the workplace.

If you hadn’t chosen Law, what do you think you'd be doing with your life?
A rural postman – you collect your deliveries in the morning – you deliver them to the outlying districts where you are well received – you go home knowing your job is well done – wonderful!

If we looked in your desk’s top drawer, what would we find?
Boxes of unused business cards which are no longer of any use as the firm has had several revamps since they were issued.