From left: Carl Weston and Ken Dixon
A firm in a good place
How do you go forward when your client surveys are showing 95 per
cent positive responses? And how does a 21-partner firm compete
against giant multi-national corporations? Carl Weston and Ken Dixon
of UK law firm Flint Bishop give some answers to Neasa MacErlean.
If Derby-based, 21-partner law firm Flint Bishop is right then the
last five years of its existence could make all the difference to
its future. Expecting an explosion of competition after the Legal
Services Act is implemented, the firm launched its 'at a distance'
services in 2005. It started with online conveyancing and followed
up with probate and wills.
So when the supermarket chains and other huge organisations
come into these areas - probably soon after mid-2011 - Flint
Bishop will have its own strategy in place and several years experience
of implementing it. The firm felt that it had the choice
between developing a strategy or going into decline because, as
Carl Weston, its marketing head, says: "From a marketing point of
view, we can't compete with [supermarkets] Tesco or Asda."
The firm had two obvious options when it looked at the implications
of the Legal Services Act. It could provide services for one of
these new mammoth providers or it could increase its own fighting
power by joining an alliance of other local firms. Instead, it rejected
these possibilities and embarked on a third, much more individual,
route. Flint Bishop decided to work with membership organisations
which have more than 5,000 members (or employees) - such as
Oxfam, the Professional Association of Teachers and the British
Medical Association. The firm already had experience of this kind of
partnership. Founded 120 years ago, Flint Bishop has been working
in the field of personal injury for 80 years - and much of the PI
work it did was through membership organisations.
When the Act comes in, opening up the legal market to new
players, owners and investors, the effect could be bloody for High
Street law firms although Ken Dixon, managing partner of Flint
Bishop, does question the appetite from some potential providers.
"Although the profession overall is poorly placed to combat a
competitive onslaught from well trusted brands, that will undoubtedly
bring with them enviable marketing budgets and expertise, this
is not a particular failing of law firms in general, I think almost any
sector would struggle to combat such a threat. That said, I have
been a little surprised at the relatively low number of brands that
currently offer legal services to their current members via a law
firm, which after all is an available option at present."
Flint Bishop, however, is working hard at battening down the
hatches and making its services as strong as possible, so should the
onslaught materialise or not, it has a strong suite of online legal
services. Crucial to this process are the client questionnaires it
conducts with all clients. These are showing a high level of satisfaction.
As the firm says on its website, the responding cadre of clients
"consistently gives us over 95% positive performance delivery
result". The fact that they run so many satisfaction surveys, says
Weston,"enables us to respond very quickly to the mark".
One relatively expensive decision that the firm has taken,
informed by these surveys, is to have a single person handling each
transaction for clients. "Some other organisations have tended to
work in big teams," says Weston. "But we've tried to differentiate
ourselves from others in that we have tried to maintain the quality
of the delivery."
But when the firm is getting positive results in 95% of cases, how
useful can the feedback be? Well, for one thing, Flint Bishop looks at
it the other way round. "We are not satisfying 5%," says Weston.
And Dixon adds: "It's about always understanding what is
happening with the 5%." In order to increase service quality further
still, the firm is intending to adopt the SERVQUAL technique in
2010, a customer service gap analysis methodology used by some
of the world's most successful organisations to measures ratings for
such qualities as reliability and responsiveness.
It is because Flint Bishop felt that maintaining quality would be so
important in the new, post Legal Services Act, that it chose the
approach it did. "If you are in an alliance, you lose control of that,"
says Weston.
The conveyancing department is now getting 30% repeat business
month on month. "That is ultimately, to us, what doing legal
business is all about," says Dixon. He sees it as a major sign of
success that clients are returning to the firm in such numbers even
though they might never meet the partners nor even see the
building. Just as he believes that the friendly atmosphere within the
firm is crucial to its identity and performance, so he believes that
flourishing relations with clients will keep it a good place to work
for many years to come.
Satisfying clients is something which also makes staff and partners
more satisfied in their own roles, in Dixon's view. And the
contentment of the 168 staff and 21 partners is crucial to the
success of the firm overall, he thinks. "It's a really friendly place to
work," he says. "I don't think you can take that for read in professional
service firms." Concentrating on this theme as well,Weston
will in 2010 be working with his counterpart in Human Resources
to take a more combined approach to issues thrown up by
SERVQUAL.
Back in 2007, Flint Bishop won the title of 'Mould Breaking Firm'
of the year at the Managing Partners' Forum awards, partly for its
work on online and 'at a distance' services. And it continues to be
innovative. In April this year, it plans to do what it believes only one
other UK law firm has done before. It hopes to launch an online TV
channel, subscription-based but free, in which five-minute news
analysis slots will take over the role of some of its written newsletters.
This will be for its business clients (as the firm has substantial
departments in company and commercial, property, employments
and other specialisms). "There is an explosion of opportunities that
digital marketing offers business," says Weston.
Because it is in continuing dialogue with clients through questionnaires,
Flint Bishop can pick up quickly on pent-up demand from
them for new services or new ways of delivering those services.
And it is not just the young who want online facilities. "Adoption of
new media doesn't really have an age barrier," says Weston. So, as
well as the online TV, Flint Bishop is planning to launch online document
storage service and an online visual marketing campaign in
2010. Having an inhouse multi-media designer makes the whole
process easier to customise and more cost-effective. "I really want
to embrace integrated campaigns which have a lot of direct mail
and PR twinned with an online side," says Weston.
The road ahead will take the firm into some unknown waters.
Getting the tone right will be a challenge in itself. As Weston
explains, online campaigns tend to be 'a bit edgy'. It would be all
too easy to strike the wrong note. Marrying that edginess into the
traditional values of the firm could mean creating some stark
contrasts.
But, however innovative the firm becomes in its use of technology,
Dixon is convinced that it must never lose the friendliness,
prudence and other human values which have, so far, preserved it
for 120 years. "We want longevity, we want Flint Bishop to be here
in 50 years time," he says. And its resilience has certainly been
tested in these last couple of years. Turnover fell 9% in the last two
years to £10.5m in 08/09 - a fall that could have brought many
firms to their knees. But the firm's careful financial approach has
kept it safe. "We don't borrow money, we don't have debts," says
Dixon. In fact, it is more than ready for the next battles ahead -
when the Legal Services Act starts to bring in those new competitive
forces. "We can invest aggressively going forward," he says.
"We've not overstretched ourselves.We're in a good place."