Linklaters has launched a client committee chaired by banking head Tony Bugg to coordinate the work it does for its biggest key clients and look for new opportunities.

The committee was established earlier this year by managing partner Gideon Moore, who describes it as "one of the cornerstones" of the firm's new strategy.

The committee will identify clients or groups of clients that are important to the firm and channel the firm's resources towards them. This could either be in terms of secondments, marketing efforts or expanding the work that Linklaters does for a client into more jurisdictions.

Moore said: "The reason I put together the [new] client committee is to make sure we have a group of driven, client-oriented partners and directors who are able to coalesce the force of Linklaters, so that we are able to focus on opportunities to service clients both now and in the future."

Another partner said the committee is looking at areas of significant growth for the firm and selecting clients the firm should prioritise.

"Like most firms, we already have a key client programme – this will be a shorter list and more targeted," the partner said.

Clients looked at by the committee will either be clients that the firm already does a lot of work with, or large organisations that present further opportunities. It could also consider groups of clients in a particular sector, which has been identified as an area for future growth.

The committee also has a remit to improve Linklaters client service in general, by better connecting offices, practices and teams and codifying best practice.

The partner said: "The scale of Linklaters is an advantage but sometimes it can be difficult getting everyone to pull together, this is about harnessing that scale".

Bugg was appointed head of banking in 2016, succeeding Moore on his elevation to managing partner. He was previously head of restructuring and insolvency and has worked on a number of high-profile matters, including leading Linklaters' team advising PwC on the long-running and lucrative administration of Lehman Brothers International (Europe).

Others on the committee include the firm's head of corporate Aedamar Comiskey, global head of client sectors Sarah Wiggins and chief marketing officer Frank Mellish, who joined Linklaters in April from Deloitte, where he was Australian head of marketing. There are also representatives from the firm's offices in Europe, the US and Asia.

It is not clear which of the firm's existing key clients will be looked at by the committee. According to Adviser Rankings' latest research, Linklaters currently acts for 18 FTSE 100 clients including mining giants Anglo American and Glencore, oil major BP, banks HSBC, Barclays and Lloyds Banking Group and energy companies National Grid and Centrica.

The introduction of a client committee is part of Moore's new strategy for the firm, which he launched at the partner conference in Monaco in April, following a wide-ranging consultation.

Other changes included in the new strategy include scrapping performance reviews and individual partner targets in order to try and foster collaboration by encouraging partners to work together. The strategy is intended to develop a more entrepreneurial culture at Linklaters and to break down silos and internal barriers within the firm.

Moore said: "We want to make sure that we are able to deliver team Linklaters to our client base, by continuing to ensure that whatever internal barriers and divisions may or not be around are removed, so that we as a collegiate and unified team can deliver the best team and the best service."

The strategy is being rolled out through the firm's various divisions, with partner groups tasked with adapting it to their practice area.

In the corporate practice, for example, a group of partners have looked at different areas of the business and types of clients and divided up responsibility for individual areas.

One corporate partner said: "It sounds like I have drunk the Kool-Aid but it feels like a strategy that is sufficiently high-level but can be made relevant for the day-to-day stuff.

"We had a big chart, like a mind-map, and as you go through it has the strategy stuff at the centre then that branches out to a whole range of products types like IPOs and private M&A, geographies and client types like corporate or private equity clients or FTSE 250 companies or banks.

"In each of those we have broken the different areas into sub-headings then somebody will take the lead role in relation to, for example, infrastructure funds, private M&A, China, energy or pro bono, or whatever it might be.

"There are 40 or so of us; your names are against a number of them as a leading partner or secondary partner."

Linklaters grew its revenue by almost 10% in the 2016-17 financial year, up from £1.31bn to £1.44bn. Profit per equity partner also increased by 7.8% to £1.568m.