Is this a good time to launch a consultancy business? Well
in a year’s time I might be able to tell you if it was a good time for me
to launch one, but right now I
can say it is a good time to be helping legal business think about their
present and their future. Technology, pressure from consumers and regulatory
reform are all impacting on the law firm model.
There are so many people talking about innovation, AI and
legal tech that you could be forgiven for thinking that we are in the middle of
a revolution. Well we probably are but the
first industrial revolution lasted over 60 years so don’t expect this one to
happen overnight. But there is no doubt that technology is changing the economy
and there is no reason to think that the legal market is exempt.
Which in-house lawyer or General Counsel hasn’t been asked
by their Finance Director to do ‘more for less’? And don’t they all pass that
pressure on to their law firms? Some demand smaller panels, preferential rates
or fixed fees. Others go much further and are thinking about what work they
push down the value chain to outsourcing experts, and how that might free their
time to concentrate on core work they used to pass out to top law firms.
Even the high street is seeing its core businesses change.
Conveyancing, probate, wills are all heading on line, at least for some people.
The prospect of on-line courts and reform of family law looms. None of this
will reduce the issues or problems that clients need help with but it might be
changing how
they consume and what
they value from their legal adviser.
On top of this regulators have been loosening the shackles
on solicitors and law firms. We have seen changes to allow all the rest of us
non solicitors to own a law firm; reforms that allowed multi disciplinary
practices to emerge and thrive and the removal of hundreds of pages of red tape
in the rule book. In early 2019 we will see the SRA introduce modern codes that
focus on standards and ethics rather than protectionism, and changes that
allows solicitors to deliver to their customers from all sorts of business that
are not as restricted as law firms. And in addition 2019 is the year for law
firms to think though their response to the Solicitors Qualifying Examination.
All of these changes come on top of the usual pressures that
law firms face to manage their costs, think about their flight plan for growth
and succession, sustain their existing business. I suspect that most
generations think they are living in the middle of major change whereas history
usually suggests the path is longer and smoother. But there is no doubt that
firms that do get to grips with the changing world will be better able to
thrive in it.
I have been at the heart of, the designer and driver, of all
of the regulatory changes described. And
I have spent the last fifteen years talking to law firms and legal business
across the UK and beyond. So it is a good time to be setting up a consultancy.
But more than that it is a great time for everyone in the legal market whether
they are global or high street law firms, multi disciplinary practices, new
entrant disrupters, unregulated businesses eyeing an opportunity to offer their
customers more services or one of the
ever growing band of solicitors. It s a great time to face the challenges
knowing that you are free to focus on your customers and business in a way that
regulators rarely allow. I will help you do that.
