It is
interesting to see so many law firm leaders thinking about SQE. I have written
previously
about the fact that the first exams in autumn 2021 mean firms need
to engage now to think about how they will prepare their future solicitors for
qualification. But I want to go further and explain why I think that law firm
leaders focused on SQE are at risk of addressing the wrong issue – probably an
irrelevant issue for people at their level of leadership and responsibility for
business strategy.
Of
course, SQE isn’t actually irrelevant. In order to become a solicitor a candidate
must meet the regulator’s standards – and SQE is how each solicitor will be
assessed against that standard. Setting the standard for solicitors is perhaps
the most important role of the SRA. But law firm leaders need to be clear that
it is a regulatory minimum – it is the standard for a solicitor to be a safe
beginner. There is no pretence from the SRA that this is the only
thing
a new solicitor needs in order to be successful in any particular law firm,
legal business or sector. It is stripped to the minimum – removing things that
are not necessary for entry to the solicitor profession and the ethical
standards our judges and the public demand. This is the radical departure with
SQE – at any other time in our legal education/legal regulation history the
regulator would have been trying to make sure that the education and training
required to become a solicitor incorporated all
the things that the most
influential firms demanded for their trainees. The SRA has now defined its role
narrowly as the setter and assessor of minimum standards. The market must
deliver the rest through collaboration, trialling, plurality, variety and
competition.
What
beyond that minimum core really matters for newly qualified solicitors and the
rest of the delivery workforce? This is the business-critical question that law
firm leaders really should be engaging with. The largest firms will select an
SQE preparation provider to get their trainees through SQE. And all of them will be competent at getting
them through SQE, though many more will fail than at present. They will all
claim excellence and quality, value for money and a good student experience.
But that is simply not enough. If all law firms think about is passing SQE then
they will be settling for the lowest common denominator – the regulatory
minimum.
What
might educators offer law firm leaders? Some are still selling the QLD and, in
particular the LPC, as if SQE is not happening. But there are some innovators
planning different moves. Some Law Schools will combine SQE1 into their law
degree, including its costs within the tuition fee. This will appeal to the
parts of the market where cost matters most. It may also help more
disadvantaged students avoid some of the risk of too much choice – a problem I
know some academics have concerns about. Others will deliver more academic
degrees, outside the current shackles of the qualifying law degree, perhaps
offering either second- or third-year route to SQE1 or a post degree summer
course either through a delivery partner or themselves. These will all deliver
basic competence, with the addition from some universities of a more rounded
and academic legal education.
But many
law firms want much more than basic competence from day one. This is where the
flexibility of SQE kicks in and the LPC or its adapted successor withers. Law
firm leaders need to link their work force strategy to their business strategy,
asking themselves: what additional knowledge and skills does their workforce
need in order to deliver the services their business will be delivering in five-
or ten-years’ time?
Do
they need technical legal skills in specific areas such as corporate law? Do
they need to understand the language and landscape of legal tech so that they
can ensure that they understand clients needs and how they can be met
efficiently? Do they need a good oversight of the legal market place that the
firm operates in - including the competitors to traditional law firms such as
managed legal service providers, MDPs, flexible lawyering models etc.? Do they
need to be able to collaborate with non-lawyers, work in client led teams, work
with different sorts of legal service providers?
Incumbent
LPC providers may well already be telling law firm leaders not to worry –
especially in the city. They will claim that they have considered all of this
and they know what is needed. The claim will be that it is tailored to SQE, to
the city and to their additional requirements such as market segment or wider
skills. I have no doubt that the course will
be aligned to what city law
firms say they need. But any firm that buys the ‘son of LPC’ is probably
missing a huge opportunity to align SQE, workforce and business
strategy in a way that has hitherto been impossible. City firms may miss the
opportunity to rethink how
to train and, where and when to do so. If
they are high street firms or independent students not attached to a law firm,
they may also miss the opportunity to think about what legal knowledge and
skills are relevant to their services and client base. Focusing only on a
replacement for the LPC for training solicitors is a missed opportunity – an
opportunity to develop a coherent whole of workforce strategy that could
encompass apprenticeships, post degree work-based training academies,
paralegals and a much stronger focus on ethics and culture.
New
providers of SQE preparation courses are emerging and they may have more
flexibility because they are not starting with an organisation set up to
deliver the LPC. They have a blank piece of paper from which to build something
more modern and flexible that supports a whole of workforce strategy.
It
becomes more interesting when we go beyond bricks and mortar Law Schools. I
expect to see at least one and quite possibly three ‘digital first’ initiatives
in SQE preparation, with additional modules focused on the extra competencies firms’
value. These will compete directly with the ‘son of LPC’ - increasing
accessibility and flexibility, reducing cost and could help diversity if
delivered well.
Perhaps
the real competition for universities will come from formal solicitor
apprenticeships and more tailored, firm led routes post 19 that prepare young
people for qualification from within the workplace with additional training,
often provided on-line or in house. The opportunity for large firms such as the
city and accountancy firms, or groups of smaller firms (perhaps by locality or
region, or by market segment such as crime or legal aid or personal injury for
example) to shape their workforce more directly will be attractive for those
that truly value their people. Developing a qualified solicitor within four or
five years post-18 years old within the workplace will be hugely attractive for
some employers and young people alike. It allows firms to focus on values and
behaviours as much as on technical knowledge and generic skills – producing
more rounded and tailored solicitors with the necessary depth of skills and
knowledge.
One of
the challenges for law firm leaders is to think about value for money alongside
the workforce strategy. Given these thousand flowers blooming, even with clear
and aligned business and workforce strategies, choosing the best routes and
education providers is a challenge. It is easy to stick what they know and to
some extent that will be fine. But successful firms go wrong when they stop
innovating and just adjust what they did yesterday.
My
sense, and I hope I am wrong, is that the new entrants to the legal market are
integrating their workforce strategy with their business strategy much better
than traditional law firms. They seem to
me to start with the problem their target market has and how they can solve it,
they think about the sort of people they need across all skills and professions
rather than just lawyer and non-lawyer, and finish with the business structure
and funding needed to deliver that.
Perhaps
my concern is that for law firms, and this probably applies to their education
providers too, the starting point is the current model and how it can be
described as meeting the emerging needs of clients, adapting it if they really
have to but trying to ensure that it is never disrupted. These are fabulous and
successful business led by impressive people, but they need people around them
that help see the opportunities ahead rather than reasons not to change. I am
sure they will not be distracted by SQE and miss the opportunity to disrupt
their current models from within so that they can maintain businesses fit for
the client driven years ahead.
