Managing Partner Forum

Succession planning – how do you prepare for when a key worker leaves?

Northern Lights | 30 May 2014

Claire Morley-Jones is the founder of HR180, a leading advisory firm that helps businesses with all aspects of people management and development. She recently delivered a talk on succession planning to the Managing Partners’ Forum and here she shares her thoughts on the issue. Succession planning is a fundamental part of any business’ future survival … Succession planning – how do you prepare for when a key worker leaves?

Do professional firms need non-executive directors? How relevant is board governance to a firm?

Northern Lights | 10 January 2014

Calum Lynch, is responsible for Grant Thornton’s Business Risk Services team outside of London. He recently spoke at the Leeds Managing Partners’ Forum, discussing risk management in professional services firms. This blog picks out some of the discussion areas from that presentation. Should your firm have an independent non-executive director? That was the question that … Do professional firms need non-executive directors? How relevant is board governance to a firm?

Do unproductive, older legal partners earn the same as major rainmakers?

Northern Lights | 14 June 2013

Guest blog by Peter Smart, Yorkshire head of Managing Partners’ Forum Well, our most recent breakfast meeting created some debate! Benjamin Viney, researcher and author of BDO’s Partner Pay and Performance 2013, compared legal partners’ earnings over the last 30 years. The report examined today’s results in comparison to those found by David Maister, business … Do unproductive, older legal partners earn the same as major rainmakers?

Are there too many lawyers? And are law firms ‘cheating’ on the figures to kid themselves?

Northern Lights | 10 January 2013

David Thurkettle of PwC gave his usual thought provoking analysis of trends in law firms from PwC’s Law firms’ survey 2012. I had introduced his session, saying that my own view of the legal market is that it is still very tough, quite patchy and performance is generally flat. David said the survey pretty much said the same thing.

Keeping employees motivated during challenging times

Northern Lights | 13 December 2012

The first challenge we had as a group was ‘how do you define ‘engaged employees’?’ This was clearly a new concept to many around the table. The consensus was that engaged employees feel involved in the business, have a clear idea about where it is going and their role in that, there is strong teamwork and employees give that bit extra because they want to see success.