The MSI Global Alliance Perspective

A landmark in British journalism

Today marks a landmark in British journalism.  Whilst I might be referring to the news that today sees 'The Times' (www.thetimes.co.uk) publishing its 70,000th edition, I am in fact referring to the fact that Edward Fennell, the long-standing contributor to its law section, describes himself as "breaking new ground" by referring to iPhone apps for lawyers!

They're beginning to emerge everywhere - and with the launch next week of the MSI Global Alliance (www.msiglobal.org) iPhone app for lawyers and accountants, we hope to take the lead among the international networks and associations as being the first such grouping to have its directory available as an app.  All exciting stuff, but not the purpose of this blog.

More interesting in today's 'Times' was the comment that many law firms are being criticised for reducing staff and partner numbers drastically whilst, at the same time, allowing partner incomes to rise significantly.

But without wishing to be unduly cynical, why is this such a surprise?  Many law firms were thought to be using the downturn to cull underperforming partners and staff - and indeed to go further by cutting complete departments.  The criticism of firms should not be that they did this - but that they had tolerated such underperformance for so long during the good times.

And the next challenge will be to keep firms lean and mean - and profitable - as and when things begin to pick up.

James Mendelssohn (jmendelssohn@msiglobal.org)
Chief Executive, MSI Global Alliance

Small law firms with big ideas ...

News over the weekend of the impending demise of Halliwells, one of the UK's largest regional law firms, was bound to generate a few column inches this week.  When you add to that the beginning of the reporting season for some of the largest firms, it is perhaps not surprising that in today's edition of 'The Times', two of the three leader stories in the business section deal with the legal profession.

David Wighton makes a number of good points.  With the resurgence of the 'Magic Circle' firms, (profits up 10% - 15% after a difficult previous year), some of the second-tier firms have decided that if they can't compete with the 'Magic Circle' firms to win the highly profitable, multinational work, then they need to bulk up, through mergers, to increase their chances of winning other international - if not multinational - work.

But mergers are not always easy things to manage - and that assumes that the firms get to the altar in the first place.  Only this week, the proposed link-up between Simmons & Simmons in the UK and Mayer Brown in the US came to nothing with, I would guess, a frightening amount of potentially charegeable time having been written off.

But there are other options.  Within MSI Global Alliance (www.msiglobal.org), the vast majority of firms approaching us, both law firms and accounting firms, do so because they are looking for broader geographic and technical reach without the loss of independence that is inevitably associated with a merger.

The law and accounting firm network or association route is not right for all firms, but it is certainly an option that should be on the agenda for those mid-tier firms looking to progress to the next level.

James Mendelssohn (jmendelssohn@msiglobal.org)
Chief Executive