Look on the websites of firms such as Baker McKenzie, Dentons, DLA Piper, Linklaters, Norton Rose Fulbright and Ropes & Gray among others and you will see a key word they use to describe themselves is ‘global’.

It has become such a popular descriptor in the legal industry that it is easy to skip over it, or assume it means something other than its technical definition. But are all these firms truly global? To be so they should at least have offices in every region.