With a recent charity abseil down Broadgate Tower under his belt and a Norfolk windmill conversion to deal with in his spare time, Baker McKenzie's London managing partner Alex Chadwick is getting used to new heights.

And his first year at the helm of Bakers' City office has also been on an upward trajectory, with estimated 2016-17 revenues for the base coming in at around £189m – a 7% increase on the previous year.

Chadwick (pictured) says the firm is aiming for more "substantial growth", driven in part by a push to improve efficiency. This summer he brought in the firm's first London COO with the hire of former Linklaters global COO Simon Thompson, and Chadwick is hoping to draw on Thompson's experience to help streamline working processes in the City base.

He says: "Simon has a background in technology and IT as well as operations, and we're looking to use those elements more across all our work both in London and across the world. We're striving for efficiency, both internally and in how we support our clients. We'll be looking at how to best use tech in terms of more efficient billing systems, smart use of data analytics, machine learning and due diligence services."

Former tax head Chadwick took over as London managing partner from Paul Rawlinson last September, with Rawlinson now the global firm's first British global chairman.

Chadwick previously spent a decade as head of Bakers' London tax team, during which time the department's headcount grew from three partners to 14, while revenue grew six-fold, and he is palpably proud and enthusiastic about how the practice has challenged the established dominance of the Big 4 accounting firms in this area.

He says: "There's often a challenge to persuade clients not to use a Big 4 adviser and to use us instead, but as we've grown in scale and recognition we've become an accepted and welcomed choice. Many tax pitches we win are price-competitive – our project management capabilities help with this."

He adds that using "nimble" teams and having senior partners work on accounts – rather than just acting as figureheads – enhances the firm's offering, an approach Chadwick wants to replicate across the London office

Separately, the firm is aiming to boost partner headcount in its City transactional teams by up to 30% in the next three years, on the back of a period of growth that has already seen partner numbers in these practices rise by almost 20% from 52 to 62 during the past year.

Notable recent hires include corporate partner Will Holder, who joined from King & Wood Mallesons in January, and Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer finance partner Geoff O'Dea, who arrived in July. The firm also hired Travers Smith senior counsel Matthew Smith as a partner in its finance practice this summer, as well as three senior associates who joined as partners from Clifford Chance, Ropes & Gray and Allen & Overy during the financial year.

Chadwick expects further lateral hires to be announced before the end of the calendar year, and says: "We need to ensure we have the right scale in our transactional practices by building with good homegrown people and high quality lateral hires. We're looking to grow in all our transactional areas: M&A, private equity, banking and finance, and tax. The objective is to boost those areas by a total of 10-20 partners by 2020 – we're looking at significant, incremental growth."

He concludes: "The growth in tax and the way we've successfully built on our people there is exactly what we are replicating more and more in the London transactional areas. It's not just about greater bench strength, but how the new practitioners interact internally to deliver a cross-practice and cross-border approach to clients. Once clients work with us, they know we can do it – we have a powerful story to tell."