The changing legal times
In discussion with agendaNi, Arthur Cox’s Alan Taylor and Peter Curran survey the changing legal services environment, including the rising demand for specialisation and commercial knowledge.
Please describe your current roles.
AT: My role as Managing Partner is to use the specialisation that Arthur Cox has across its more than 400 professional staff to ensure that we are able to bring to the local market the strength and depth of expertise necessary to service the demand for top quality legal input.
Arthur Cox brings experience and knowledge gained from advising both the public sector and the private sector at the highest levels, on decisions of importance for the whole economy. My role is to ensure that this expertise is harnessed in the most efficient way for the benefit of our clients.
PC: I worked with Arthur Cox in Dublin up until 2008 and am now based in Belfast where I head up the Projects and Procurement Group. This team is focussed principally on public sector and utilities work. We generally advise public bodies and utilities on their procurement of projects and contracts as well as the private sector contractors who compete for this work. We work across a range of sectors including waste, transport, urban regeneration, housing, health, education, energy, telecoms and IT.
What is the biggest challenge facing Arthur Cox at present?
AT: The biggest challenge for us in the current economic climate is to maintain our market-leading position. The economic downturn and recession has adjusted a lot of markets and one of the challenges is to maintain that link that we have with the client, to be very much part of the client’s team and to have the support available for the clients in the difficult environment. Not everyone can do that but we’ve been doing it very well. Arthur Cox has grown, but it’s always a challenge maintaining that position.
PC: We have ramped up our teams significantly over the last two or three years to match our clients’ needs and we have raised our profile such that we are now recognised as the leading firm advising on public sector work across all of the key sectors. We find that more and more our clients expect deep knowledge of the sectors in which they are active and we work hard at maintaining that level of specialism in all relevant areas in order to provide the level of service that clients now demand.
Obviously the difficult economic environment presents a challenge for everybody in business today. We adapt our practice regularly to match developments in the market and in these uncertain times this is something that we have to keep under constant review.
The Projects and Procurement Group has been one of the busiest areas of the firm over the last couple of years despite the economic conditions. We haven’t seen the full effect of public sector cuts affect our workload so far; the challenge will be to deal with that situation if and when it arises.
How have your clients been impacted by the current economic downturn?
AT: I think it’s very varied across each of the sectors but a lot of our clients have done very well, partly because the sectors they are in are not particularly hit by the recession and they’re quite constant. The agri-food sector, for example, continues to be quite robust. Larger scale corporate client work has slowed over recent years although there are now lot of reorganisations taking place. Property is still a very difficult sector.
Because we’re acting for a lot of the bigger, well-known brand names, they continue to do quite well and have a global business which, in the current environment, enables them to reduce their exposure to the worst of the downturn.
There are winners and there are losers in the recession and I suppose the key is really to use the knowledge we’ve acquired over a period of time and the specialisation we have acquired to help both in whatever issue they face or whatever opportunity they face. That is particularly evident whenever the business failures come and you can actually help in a way that turns something around by restructuring in a certain way or providing a solution.
Looking back, what has been the big change in legal services in 2010 as opposed to 10-20 years ago and what will be the biggest challenge over the coming decade?
PC: I think clients are more demanding now and expect you to be available virtually 24/7. New technology and communications have made us much more accessible and mobile. Clients also now expect a level of specialism that simply was not available in this market a few years ago and they expect local advisors to provide that. They don’t necessarily want to go to London anymore to get the advice. Clients now appreciate that there are locally based lawyers who fully understand the industries and sectors that they are working within. As a result, they are increasingly willing to give lawyers a more hands-on role.
AT: I think we’re being asked for more commercial advice in conjunction with our legal advice. There’s much more of a commercial view as to ‘how do we do something?’ as opposed to ‘can you now document it?’
PC: I think that’s because they appreciate that we understand the sectors. Take waste: we understand how the sector works, not only from a legal perspective but also from a commercial perspective. That’s what they want and that’s what they expect. They don’t want a purely legal view anymore; you have to appreciate the commercial aspects.
AT: Probably the biggest shift over the last 20 years has been the clients’ ‘flight towards quality’ because the cost of a mistake, or not making the right decision now, is not as easily covered as it was, because margins are tighter.
It’s a much more difficult global trading environment, it’s much more competitive and I think over the next 20 years there’s much more movement towards going to somebody who actually does know the answer.
PC: Obviously the private sector in Northern Ireland has to grow and it has to look beyond the boundaries of this jurisdiction. It has to look to Europe and further afield to do business and I would say over the next 10 years we’re going to see businesses here playing catch-up with the rest of the UK and indeed the Republic of Ireland, in terms of globalising and selling products and services abroad.
How would you describe the culture of Arthur Cox?
AT: I would say it’s very commercial. I think there’s also a lot of freedom for people to develop their own career, style and develop a specialisation.
PC: I think as managers of people, we’re very approachable; we’re also very hands-on. We are both heavily involved in client work; we don’t just run the business. We try to delegate where appropriate whilst supervising everything that goes out. We find that our lawyers enjoy the quality work our clients provide and they respond to this by seeking to provide excellent, high quality and commercial advice at all times. It’s a very friendly and collegiate environment but at the same time it’s very hard working. The lights are rarely turned out at six o’clock.
