Cash à la carte
FEATURES
As a new financial year approaches, Josh Adcock investigates how SME firms are cooking up processes for a better finance strategy
Amanda Hamilton at the National Association of Licensed Paralegals on the future role of paralegals
Thomson Reuters and John Grayston, founder of EU regulation and trade law firm Grayston & Company, on Brexit
Maud Rousseau at Propero discusses recent SRA rules changes and the importance of good marketing and compliance
GET YOUR COPY NOWISSUE IN BRIEF
If you were able to beat the storm to join us for LPM South, thank you for attending and I hope you stayed around for our LPM Practice Excellence Awards ceremony – winners announced on pp20-21. Well done to everyone who was shortlisted and congratulations to the winners!
In this issue, we ask: what’s cooking in SME law firm financials? Josh Adcock reports (p14). Worried you might be pushing people too hard? Joanna Kingston-Davies, group chief operating officer at Jackson Lees, talks about how you can be kind and still be a successful leader (p5).
And, if you’re wanting some inspiration from outside the legal sector, blast off to another world as I report in from the Westminster Business Forum on space sector challenges and innovation (p30).
CASH A LA CARTE
As we approach the end of one financial year, it’s no surprise that many SME law firm leaders have budgets and financial strategies at the top of their minds. There may not be a magic finance wand to sweep away all the business-as-usual challenges that plague many a law firm, but there are various processes and strategies that could offer the financial stability firms are looking for.
SUPPORT ACT
Let’s face it, the way the legal sector is developing means that, over time, fewer consumers will be able to afford the services of solicitors or barristers. Paralegals are emerging as the go-to profession for such assistance, but the profession still remains an unknown and unrecognised quantity – that is, to all but the professional paralegals themselves.
BREXIT THROUGH THE GIFT SHOP
Brexit is now real. On 31 January, the United Kingdom formally left the European Union. To deliberate about what happens next and how multinational companies will be affected, Thomson Reuters turned to John Grayston, who has practised EU law in Brussels for 15 years and in 2007 founded Grayston & Company, an independent law firm specialising in EU regulatory and trade law.
WEB SIGHTS
These days, full regulatory compliance seems to be the holy grail for professional services. Legal practices in particular are quick to publicise their credentials to industry regulators and clients, and big money is being spent on hiring heads of marketing and compliance to legitimise these claims. But how compliant is the legal sector really?
