On October 15-18th 2019, the Private Client Global Elite and their Rising Leaders congregated in the historic halls of Somerville College, University of Oxford, to participate in a Mini MBA and Rising Leaders Forum. Interestingly, Somerville College was founded to include the excluded – something the Global Elite is working hard to achieve with the industry’s Rising Leaders. Somerville College was created for women when universities refused them entry, and for people of diverse beliefs when the establishment religion was widely demanded. As we ate our lunch and sipped our tea during the breaks, the college’s most famous alumni – Margaret Thatcher – kept a watchful eye from her portrait peering down at us.

The night prior to the prospective Mini MBA courses, the Global Elite and Rising Leaders had the chance to get to know one another over a private dinner, with an “off the record” discussion. Our members discussed both the internal law firm facing issues they suffer and the external client related difficulties of being a private client lawyer in 2019, ultimately sharing best practice amongst themselves

Global Elite: Mini MBA

The Global Elite Mini MBA was chaired by Professor Michael Smets, Said Buisness School at the University of Oxford. Professor Smets channelled the Global Elite members to “create an orchestrating culture” during their time together. So what does that mean, exactly?

First of all, members were asked to review their own competitive advantage by orchestrating their “strategic swirl.” Members assessed their own expertise, reputation and the service that they offer to clients in order to understand their strengths and weaknesses and how to accelerate their development looking forward. For instance, whilst some members felt they had a high expertise rating, their reputation could be impacted by a lack of partnerships/ relationships that they hold and their service might be stunted due to poor communication skills.  Members were then asked to address their gaps and think of ways to strengthen such areas going forward, to improve the momentum of their “swirl.”

In conclusion, members needed to shift their mindsets from being “experts” to “orchestrators,” whilst leveraging existing strengths and spotting their gaps in order to unlock hidden value.

Rising Leaders: Mini MBA

Recommended to the Global Elite by several leading law firms, the Rising Leaders Mini MBA was chaired by Simon Dawkins of Red Kite Training. Members were tasked with joining an imaginary new professional firm and being responsible for the management of said firm. Their success depended on the following and enabled the Rising Leaders to understand exactly what it takes to run a successful law firm:

  • How much fee income they generated
  • How much they made
  • How well they managed their cash, receivables and WIP
  • How much bank finance they needed
  • How they managed their resources and risk

As you can see, the Mini MBA was highly interactive and the members were taught the fundamentals by moving through a fictitious board game.

After completing the “Ready for business” activity, members then learnt about “The cardinal sins and rules of profitability.” Members were taught about, amongst other areas, the business cycle for law firms, the key drivers of financial success within law firms, which drivers can have the biggest impact on financial success and how they can personally contribute to the financial success of their firms.

In summary, the Mini MBA was extremely practical and insightful for future leader… but don’t just take our word for it:

“It was an absolute pleasure to take part in the mini-MBA and Rising Leaders Forum. Both days were excellent and I have already recommended [the Mini MBA leader] to my firm.” Lucy Diggle, Walkers, Cayman Islands.

The Rising Leaders Forum

Launched alongside Piers Barclay of Macfarlanes in 2019, The Rising Leaders Forum was created by the Rising Leaders, for the Rising Leaders. Yes – that’s right, only Rising Leaders spoke and only Rising Leaders attended.

The Advisory Board was fundamental in crafting the agenda and proposing emerging topics, such as “Next gen philanthropy: Innovation and impact” and “Virtual family office: A natural progression from ‘trusted advisor?’” The Board, made up of the “who’s who” of UK, European, US, offshore and Asia are private client advisors who are either Senior Associates or Partners with less than 5 years’ experience.

Chaired by Piers Barclay, Macfarlanes and Bernadette Carey, Carey Olsen, the forum was attended by around 50 Rising Leaders, all keen to participate in discussion and share their experiences.

To set the scene for the day, Professor Michael Smets, Said Business School, University of Oxford and Simon Ridpath, incoming Managing Partner, Charles Russell Speechly shared their gems of wisdom.

Titled “The business of running a law firm,” Rising Leaders had to understand that in order to create change at any level in a law firm, the three elements which make up a law firm need to be systemically changed at the same time. The elements include strategic control, financial control and operational control and are made up of subparts including, but not limited to, reputation, billable hours, bonding, partnership governance and collegiality. Emphasis was put on the fact that when each element comes under pressure, one area  cannot be tweaked in order to produce change. Tweaking one area leads to pressure on the next area and so on, leading to a domino effect. This is particularly evident with current trends, such as AI/ analytics, millennials, ABS/ ASLPs etc.

Whilst Professor Smets focused on the theoretical side to running a law firm, Simon Ridpath looked at how Managing Partners seek to operationalise their vision when they become charged with running a law firm. As the incoming Managing Partner, Simon spoke rationally about the difficulty in measuring vision, core values and strategy. After all, what is deemed a ‘success?’ Metrics can include financial performance, scale, people (output and input), locations, rankings, social media and press coverage. However, the key is buy-in from the employees of the firm – to keep pushing, to keep challenging everyone towards ambitious targets which are still realistic in order to get engagement across the business. The Managing Partner’s role is to link every employee – and the firm’s vision, values and strategy – together.

The remaining sessions of the day were led by Rising Leaders, including “Next gen philanthropy: Innovation and impact” hosted by Isobel Morten Macfarlanes, UK and Sasha Grinberg, Cadwalader, USA. Isobel and Sasha spoke about the difference between their Next Gen clients and their older clients. Primarily, how incredibly involved the younger generation are in wanting control over their assets. For instance, common questions from the Next Gen include “what is the impact and what are the risks of where our money is going? What are our long-term legacies?” In particular, the Next Gen have voiced concerns about the the political risk of having structures offshore and are more recently opting to bring structures onshore and pay more tax/make charitable donations.

So what are the options, for the advisor? Sasha and Isobel emphasised that whilst the Next Gen’s needs are different to the older generation, philanthropy can play a wider role in family organisations and can act as a bonding agent. In particular, it gives the younger generation an opportunity to sit with the family and learn how to make business decisions. Advisors should encourage philanthropy (where applicable) with older generations of clients as a vehicle to include the younger generation, as it encourages open communication and visibility about the family’s wealth structuring.

Other sessions during the Rising Leaders Forum included:

  • Virtual family office: A natural progression from “trusted advisor?”
  • The transition from associate, to counsel, to partner and beyond: Quality vs. building leverage
  • Changing families: Has the law kept pace with medical and social advances?
  • Running a smooth (and successful) cross border matter
  • How would you like to help make your firm a more inclusive workplace?
  • Using International Business Treaties to your client’s benefit
  • Arbitration: Time to stop fighting (and start arbitrating)?
  • Would I lie to you? The 6 minute pitch

We had phenomenal feedback from the event – see below.

If you would like to send your Rising Leader or attend yourself in 2020, we are due to hold the Rising Leaders Forum on October 8t at Home House, London. Get in touch for more details.

“The quality of the speakers at the Rising Leaders Forum was very impressive and I was particularly pleased that the sessions were so interactive.”  Lucy Diggle, Walkers, Cayman Islands

“Just to say thanks so much for the hard work of you and your team on Friday. It was a really great day and obviously involved some serious organisation by you, as well as Piers and Bernadette who were great chairs. I thought the level that the day was pitched at and the mix of international lawyers was a refreshing format, and that really showed through based on how engaged everybody was.” Emma Holland, Stewarts, UK