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Could your legal practice be one of the 53% that would cease trading?

For a number of years Legal & General (L&G) has conducted a range of research with owners of businesses of all sizes at different stages of their development and growth. More than ever before legal practices are undergoing significant change; in leadership, succession planning and business structure as the most tax efficient and flexible vehicle is sought.

Starting a new law firm - what do I need to consider?

As specialist advisors to the legal sector, we have helped many firms to start practising. That has particularly been the case during the past couple of years as the profession has become more niche-focused.

Is it worth being a partner in a law firm?

The Law Society Law Management Section (“LMS”) benchmarking survey for 2017 has arrived. It’s a great read and there is something useful for everyone in there. Although, there is a reason that we at Armstrong Watson do individual benchmarking exercises for our legal clients, rather than rely on these UK wide trends – it can be tricky to spot the key metrics hidden in so many pages of data and ask yourself the pertinent “so what”.

A growing team bringing further specialist support to the Legal Sector

We are delighted to announce a new addition to their legal sector team. Tom Blandford has been appointed as Legal Sector Director and will focus on supporting lawyers throughout Yorkshire and the UK with specialised advice.

Tom’s appointment comes following a huge increase in demand for our specialist legal sector services, which include succession planning, buying, selling and merging law firms.

Over the last year our legal sector team has had 67 new instructions from law firms and are currently running at a rate of two new instructions per week.

Welcome two new Directors in the legal, education and not for profit sectors

Armstrong Watson is delighted to announce the promotion of Karen Rae and Rosy Rourke to Director. 

Both Karen and Rosy support clients throughout the country specialising in the education/not for profit and legal sectors respectively. 

Karen joined Armstrong Watson in 1996, working within Audit and Assurance throughout her career specialising in Education and Not for Profit sectors.  Karen provides specialist advice, support and guidance to both charities and the education sector and the individuals responsible for the management and governance of those entities.

Restructuring in the Legal Sector

Every law firm, indeed every business, goes through phases dependent upon the economy, its clients, its staff and its partners. On occasions the firm will face challenges which need to be addressed in order to ensure that future success (or even survival) of the firm. This article focuses on the shorter term issues of timing, cash management, forecasting and understanding the strategic position.

How law firms use external strategic reviews to improve their businesses

There is no doubt that the legal sector has recently undergone a period of extensive change and reform. The effects of those reforms are only just beginning to be seen now, and where some firms have prospered, others have not, particularly those with exposure to legal aid and personal injury work.

It has become increasingly difficult to maintain profitability and generate cashflow, even for those firms which are prospering. Management must understand the drivers of profitability, and the key tools to unlock cash.

ABS – threat or opportunity?

The advent of the full provisions of the Legal Services Act on 6 October 2011 and the opening of ABS applications to the SRA on 3 January 2012 have been much heralded.

In response, many practitioners, commentators and advisers have spoken in terms of ‘defending against new entrants’ or protecting the position of the established, predominantly high street firms. Both of these notions assume that Alternative Business Structures are a threat.

Outcomes focused regulation and its impact on running your law firm as a business

Outcomes focused regulation (‘OFR’) was introduced on 6 October 2011 and despite much publicity within the profession, evidence suggests that not all law firms have made significant strategic business changes as a result.

I’m not going to concentrate on the technical compliance issues here. I want to cover the much more interesting impact of OFR on how law firms run as businesses. It could be argued that the commercial business aspects of OFR should force lawyers to do what perhaps they should have been doing anyway, which is to run their businesses as businesses.