Don’t give up the day job

Can a managing partner really split the fee-earning and management role and hope to be effective in both positions? Andrew Gregory, managing partner of DWF, uses his own experiences to argue that it is not only possible but the best way to ensure internal co-operation and confidence, excellent client service, and good overall business development.

I have been qualified for just over 20 years. When I came into private practice there were few professional managers involved in law firms. There was a strong ethos within many firms that partners had their own client bases and the provision of legal advice to the clients was the first responsibility of each and every partner. While partners would take on additional responsibilities for the finance and other administration functions, these were seen as secondary, something that you did in your spare time after you had finished dealing with your client’s affairs.

This state of affairs meant that many law firms were badly managed in a large number of areas. The conveyancing monopoly for solicitors propped up many a struggling firm. For some, there was a prevailing attitude that all that they needed to do was keep servicing the clients and the management of the firm would look after itself. With the abolition of the monopoly came a much more competitive approach from solicitors. Clients started to shop around to get the best price for certain types of work and solicitors started to under-cut one another on price.

There were a few spectacular failures, for example, the Liverpool firm Deacon Goldrein and Green, where all the partners were made bankrupt. I acted for one of the banks in that case and I recall that the case sent shock waves throughout the profession. Suddenly, we realised we were mortal like everyone else after all.

In the bad old days, little thought went into other administrative functions such as human-resource management. The idea that you had to talk to your staff and get them to engage with you on issues affecting the firm was alien to many a partner.

Just as UK Plc has developed in the past 20 years, I believe that the management ethic seen in so many other areas of commerce and industry has gradually crept up on most law firms.

Over the past ten years, many of the larger firms have fully embraced the concept of sound, independent and entirely professional management at all levels. I believe that many of the national firms now put good HR practice at the core of their management structure. Sound and strong financial discipline is at the heart of these firms.

Non-lawyers are now often involved in the management of law firms at senior levels. Many firms have recognised that lawyers are often not the best managers. The individualistic and skilful approach often required from the lawyer when dealing with clients means that the same person is often not the one to best market the firm, or create the time that good management at all levels undoubtedly requires. Yet there is often much resistance to the idea of a non-lawyer telling a lawyer (particularly if the lawyer is also a partner) how to run the business.

There will always be tensions, particularly in the small to medium-sized firms, between the equity partners of the business and non-lawyer managers. Equity partners are, I suspect, even more aware of the risks of private practice, post Enron. Now partners acutely believe failure could happen to them. Against this sort of background it is hardly surprising that non-lawyer managers often find it difficult to implement fundamental change.

The most successful firms are those that allow the talent to rise to the top and create a structure that allows that talent, whether lawyer or non-lawyer, to reach its full potential.

I am a strong advocate of the policy that lets the people best suited to manage a firm do just that. Sometimes this might be a lawyer in which case a balance must be found between the management needs of the business and the other responsibilities that the partner carries.

In my case, I was elected to the newly formed management board of DWF in 1998 as managing partner of the Manchester office. At that time, I was heavily involved in client work as a busy insolvency lawyer. My tenure as managing partner came to an end in December 2003. During the past five years, I have certainly had plenty of experience in balancing my role as an insolvency lawyer, manager of a team of insolvency lawyers, marketer and board representative. I used to describe my role as an insolvency lawyer as ‘my day job’.

In the early years, I am sure I spent far too little time on the management side of the business and was very fortunate to have, in my colleagues on the board, a strong and very supportive group of partners who well understood the pressures I was labouring under. But as DWF grew, particularly from 2000 onwards, it was necessary for me to stop treating ‘my other job’ as something I fitted in between client work. The firm was growing fast and we began to take on professional managers in different areas of the business. Probably the most significant breakthrough was the appointment of an experienced and accomplished HR director. Her influence on the firm began to create a change in culture where partners such as me were compelled to devote quality time to management issues.

Despite the pressures that I encountered in my early years as managing partner, from the competing interests of client work and management responsibilities, I believe that all lawyers engaged in a management role should retain some client work. I say this for the following reasons:

Lawyer managers need to keep in touch with what is happening at the coalface, as the demands of clients are changing. For example, I have found in the past two years that the growth in electronic communications has revolutionised many aspects of commercial work, such as corporate finance, where very little paper appears to be actually exchanged between solicitors as deals progress. This has had a major impact on the way deals develop and can impact a lawyer’s confidence, which is a major issue. If the confidence bubble bursts then all can be lost. I have spoken to many lawyers about this, some that I greatly admire. I have been astonished to listen to them about the loss of confidence that can be suffered once the lawyer ‘puts down the tools’;
The most successful lawyer managers are the ones that the rest of the partnership trust and respect. One of the best ways to earn the trust and respect of lawyers is to do a good job for the clients. Without that ingredient, it can be difficult to get the buy in required from the rest of the lawyers in a firm;
It is unhealthy for a firm to retain the same management team for too long. The good managers are the ones that know when to step down or move sideways to allow others to come through. This allows the talent to rise to the top. However, what happens to the lawyer, who has given up his day job and then finds he is not re-elected to the board? Where do they go then? It is crucial for any firm to ensure that a culture is created that allows those partners, involved to a very significant degree in management, to be able to return to the day job and be ‘relaunched’ into the client base.

So how do you find that balance between the management and client work? I have no magic solution and there is no right or wrong way. Much depends on the size of the firm, the nature of the client work undertaken by the partner and the culture of the firm. But here are a few suggestions:

The partner must have a good team of quality lawyers around him so that he can manage that team with a light touch and allow them to operate most of the client work, so that the partner’s role can be limited to practice development and supervision of the team;
The work type must be of a nature where the needs of clients do not require the partner to act at short notice. For example, the pressures on completion of corporate or property work may make it difficult for partners in these areas to be able to free themselves up to devote adequate time to the management role;
The culture of the firm must be supportive and at times forgiving. If the partner is to manage well then he must devote adequate time and give priority to this area. Likewise, his partners need to accept that the needs of the clients must always come first. A balance must be created by the firm that allows a disciplined approach to management duties, but at the same time flexibility where possible to accommodate the partner;
The identity and the approach of the other members of management are very important. We appointed a chairman in 1998 who is a chartered accountant and experienced businessman but is not a lawyer. His experience in industry has been invaluable to us. He has encouraged us to embrace a strong-management ethic and create a management structure that allows the board to pass down authority to the partners who are charged to manage their parts of the business on a day-to-day basis. This means that many management tasks can be delegated to the partners. After all, it is the partners who manage the firm and each of them should take their share of the responsibility to do so;
You need lots of energy. Despite all of the points made above, there are never enough hours in the day and most of my working days last at least 12 hours and often longer. There is no substitute for hard work;
Finally, it helps to have a very understanding family. My wife is very supportive and understanding of the pressures and, in this regard, I am very lucky.

I have enjoyed my time as managing partner and have learnt a lot about management in the past five years. My partners were kind enough to re-elect me to the DWF board in December 2003. We have extended the board to include more partners and I shall have a new role sitting on the board. I will not, however, be giving up the day job just yet.

Andrew Gregory is managing partner of DWF. He can be contacted at: andrew.gregory@dwf.co.uk.