Fiona Carlin, Baker McKenzie

Baker McKenzie has ramped up plans to fully financially integrate its offices across Europe, the Middle East and Africa.

The firm, which started the process early last year when it brought its London office and seven European operations into a single profit pool, has now added its United Arab Emirates and Egypt outposts into the structure.

The two offices joined earlier this month, taking the number of offices in the financially integrated arm – dubbed EMEA+ – to 16.

EMEA+ also includes the firm's Brussels, Amsterdam, Stockholm, Madrid, Johannesburg, Bahrain and Qatar offices, and consists of about 2,000 people, including 275 partners.

Its offices in France, Germany, Italy and central Europe currently remain outside of the structure.

EMEA+ head and Baker McKenzie partner Fiona Carlin told Legal Week that the first year of the new system had been "a bit of an experiment" and "a major shift".

She said: "The main challenge has been moving away from an office-centric culture to a practice-led organisation. One obstacle has been dealing with people's innate nervousness to change. During the first year, we've been focusing on alignment and clarifying why we're doing this, and building trust."

The flexible lockstep compensation system is now aligned across all, which is a change for some smaller offices that previously operated a more 'eat what you kill' structure, Carlin added.

She said: "Partners say it's easier to bring collective resources to the table. Our banking and finance team in Saudi Arabia landed a mandate on a top bank merger in the region because they were able to tap into resources more easily, and not deal with splitting fees etc.

"It's about showing people this isn't top-line management telling them what they can and can't do – this integration is to enable us to make smarter and better decisions about hiring, clients and technology," she added.

The push is part of a wider restructure of the firm designed to promote best practice and simplify internal structures. According to the firm, it aims to have three primary profit centres "within a few years" – one in the Americas, one in Asia-Pacific and one in EMEA.

The firm has also taken steps to reorganise its back-office functions in recent months. Earlier this year, it undertook an initial review of its London professional and business services (PBS) teams, which resulted in 46 roles cut.

The cuts followed a consultation that kicked off last year as part of a three-year assessment of Baker McKenzie's global PBS capabilities.