Profile: Eversheds

The new strategy for global law firm Eversheds focuses on offering service excellence and 'making it happen'. UK managing partner Bryan Hughes tells Richard Brent how its award-winning approach to client-relationship management helps achieve this goal.

There can’t be many law firms out there that wouldn’t claim clients are right at the top of their priority list. Retaining clients and attracting new business are key to profitability, in turn generating additional revenue for attracting the best recruits in a competitive market and forging a reputation for excellent service delivery. However, Eversheds is one firm that has been consistently recognised for the strength of its client-relationship-management (CRM) strategy, most recently claiming the top gong in this area at the Managing Partners’ Forum (MPF) European Practice Management Awards in October 2006.

Strategic change for client service
UK managing partner Bryan Hughes is the man responsible for delivering the client-relationship programme. His appointment in May last year was one of a number of senior management changes intended to improve the service offered to the firm’s international roster of clients. A new, more integrated network across Europe promises improved efficiency when handling growing client demand for cross-border transactions. Michael Brown was made European managing partner in a new appointment based in Paris; Brown and Hughes report to chief executive David Gray.

Hughes first joined Gray on the executive board as chief operations officer (COO) when Gray was appointed managing partner in May 2003. Re-elected in an uncontested election in May 2006, Gray then became chief executive, and Hughes managing partner, to reflect the different focus of their respective roles.

But Hughes says his new role isn’t a radical departure from his previous position. He explains: “David has overall responsibility for strategy, focusing heavily on the external profile of the business and relationship-building on major accounts. My focus is more on the operation and delivery of the business plan and the budget. So there was no major change when I became UK managing partner, save from focusing more on actual business operations than on business services and working more with the practice-group heads. I also have prime accountability for our market strategy, which includes how we develop our sectors and the client-service programme.”

Eversheds is calling this strategy ‘Making it Happen’, and one of Hughes’ recent engagements was to head up each of the UK offices’ annual general meetings. “My theme is service excellence. I think a lot of companies talk service excellence – like a lot of things – but not everyone delivers it. We’re using our CRM programme to help ramp up this approach to service delivery – and to get the whole business focused on tailoring the product lines to the clients’ needs and delivering exactly what they want.”

The CRM strategy has evolved over a number of years, but strong profits per equity partner (PEP) promise to lead to extra investment in this area in 2007 (in May 2006 the firm announced it had broken the £400,000 PEP barrier for the first time). For example, the firm is currently in the process of developing a key-account-management system to give more resource and support to servicing its main clients. “We’ve already invested a lot of money in the actual design, in the IT support and in the training of partners, but we believe you can always do better,” Hughes admits.

Focus on feedback
One recent initiative is the appointment of a number of firm ‘champions’, who are representatives of each practice group and office, he continues. They are sponsored by the partners in charge of each practice group, and work with senior management to arrive at an awareness of what service excellence ‘looks like’ for their particular clients. The needs of clients in one practice group may be different from those in another, Hughes explains. “People need to go back and design their own templates for service excellence, which is a huge investment in time and the availability of senior management across the entire business.”

The basis of this review will be a set of criteria Eversheds has devised. Dubbed the ‘10 Cs’, these are ten core competencies, ranging from commerciality to chemistry, all considered to be key to the service excellence the firm is striving for. Rather than just identifying these qualities however, Eversheds also goes so far as to ask its clients to rate the service being received in each area. “We’ve got a rating for the whole firm, which shows, for example, how many clients gave us the top rating or the top two ratings. And we’ve set ourselves strategic goals to improve on those. We can rate each practice group, each group in each office, and ultimately the challenge is to be able to assess every partner in every team,” Hughes says.

Another innovation, and one cited by the MPF in its deliberations, is the use of independent review partners (IRPs) to gauge client satisfaction. “For our major accounts we ensure the review process is independent. Somebody other than the client partner will go and see the client and talk about how the relationship is progressing,” Hughes explains. This is sometimes completed by an external organisation, but it also requires a significant investment in training the partners themselves. “Lawyers aren’t necessarily trained to listen,” Hughes continues. “We’re trained to answer problems, solve queries and provide solutions, but this is about actually listening to clients and giving them an opportunity to tell us what we could do better. We trained a significant number of senior partners in this over a two-day course.”

In spite of the considerable time investment, Hughes insists that partners willingly spend their time talking to clients in this way. “We’re all busy people, but it’s a commitment you need to give. We have to know clients, and understand them and their business. That requires an investment in time from senior people. It’s something you have to do.” There is also an emphasis on the client-service team rather than just the client partner. Informal events for firm and client secretaries have been held at Harrods, for instance. Maximising efficiency of communication is also a priority within Eversheds itself, often involving multiple sites. “The CRM programme means we’ve got to integrate at every level, so communication does present a challenge,” Hughes admits.

The IT factor – powering people
While the team will often communicate by video-link as well as the usual e-mail, however, Hughes thinks that technology only has a supportive role to play in the CRM function. This is something that has fuelled no little debate since the advent of CRM: Is it a system to be bought and implemented, or a way of life to be instilled and nurtured? “Obviously we’ve got a knowledge-management database that contains our client information. Making sure the system is up-to-date and contains the right information, and that the right people can access it, is certainly important. The technology also plays a part in the review system, because if a review partner visits we need to ensure all the data is captured, kept and cascaded out to the right people. There’s no point in getting feedback if you don’t use it.

“But proactively satisfying the client isn’t about technology. It’s about relationships and how you interact with people. We need to make sure people realise that is the balance. It’s about attitude and commitment – not about pressing a button.”

In fact Eversheds recently took the decision to outsource its non-core IT activities. Hughes explains: “There are better opportunities in an IT company and with dual data centres the backup systems improved overnight. We know we’ll never be cutting-edge in IT because we’re a law firm and this frees up time and gives us peace of mind. It’s also important to realise that IT enhancement doesn’t always solve the problem. One of the biggest difficulties is something we call recognition of need. We don’t have infinite resources and the challenge is sometimes to decide just which projects to invest in.”

Even as a support function though, various technology products have helped the firm to deliver its vision. One of these, the Competition Online Toolkit, was an e-learning tool developed with client input as an alternative to tailored training every time. “We now do a lot of e-learning at Eversheds, which can get things done a lot quicker than the ‘talk and chalk’ approach we used to use. E-learning has moved on incredibly in the last few years,” Hughes says.

Other plans for 2007 include continuing to roll out ‘project management’ throughout the firm – a concept that breaks down a client transaction into the finer details and costs that make it up. The corporate and litigation groups have piloted project management for three years, but management has now committed to rolling it out across the firm by May 2007. “Again we’re training the whole business,” Hughes explains. “Clients tell us they want cost-certainty and cost-control, so we’re ensuring that’s what we deliver.”

With a new, larger London office ready to be completed and occupied by 2008, Eversheds is a firm poised for even further growth in the future. Building on the £420,000 PEP figure for 2006, David Gray is now aiming to exceed £600,000 by 2008. And while it is no replacement for real, personal relationships with clients, investment in and intelligent use of technology has certainly shown it can help the firm to make it happen.

This article was originally published in the February 2007 edition of Managing Partner magazine.