Positive thinking - will 2015 be the year Addleshaw Goddard bounces back?
Struggling firm is pinning its hopes on a new strategic plan
January 16, 2015 at 04:43 AM
3 minute read
Those seeking some positive news two weeks into a year that is already generating unsettling economic headlines may draw some comfort from the New Year predictions of a selection of senior partners approached by Legal Week for their thoughts on the year ahead.
M&A values rose to a post-financial crisis high last year, the IPO market is already starting to get going again and, leaving to one side the uncertainty generated by the forthcoming UK general election and the eurozone's continuing economic woes, with less than four months to go until the end of the current financial year, the outlook for the UK's leading law firms is looking fairly bright.
One firm that will be desperately hoping for a good year is Addleshaw Goddard, as we report this week.
After high-profile partner exits, plunging profitability and a host of bad headlines over recent years, the firm is long overdue some good news stories. And managing partner John Joyce is on a mission to get them.
So far, all that has emerged is a vision of where Addleshaws wants to be. The firm is still in the process of drawing up the detailed strategy it will need to follow to achieve its ambitions. Success will depend not on the firm's aspirations, but on its execution of this strategy. The stakes are high, because Addleshaws has been in this position before – in 2011 when it last drew up a strategic plan that was designed to revive the firm.
Given how long it has been underperforming against its key competitors, Addleshaws is running out of chances to rediscover the halcyon days during which it was a pin-up for success.
The fact that Joyce acknowledges this predicament is a good start. While many of the problems facing the firm now look from the outside to be the same as those it faced in 2011, this time round by all accounts there is one crucial difference: partner buy-in.
Partners may have been aware of the problems facing the firm five years ago, but they did not appear to understand – or perhaps agree with – management's plan to fix these issues. Consequently, with a divided partnership there was little progress.
Now, with Joyce promising that partners will be held accountable for the success of the firm's new strategy, the onus is on all of them to deliver success. Whether the eventual outcome is independence or a merger, he will no doubt be crossing all of his fingers that this time they listen.
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