Following on from our previous blog posts Law firm differentiation: could responsiveness by the answer? and Law firm differentiation: what about price?
we will now explore some of the emerging differentiation themes that are identified in our recently published report, Standing out from the Crowd. The report is based on a survey of more than 250 in-house lawyers, the majority of which were SMEs.
The research highlighted two additional factors that firms are increasingly considering when instructing firms.
Corporate social responsibility
The first is that firms demonstrate responsible business practice or corporate social responsibility. True, with an importance ranking of 5.0 out of 10, this was ranked as the second least important factor in-house lawyers consider when instructing firms. That said, anecdotal feedback suggests this is certainly rising up the agenda.
Of course, responsible business practice and corporate social responsibility are wide catch all terms that encompass a number of initiatives, from gender diversity to environmental sustainability. As outlined in the box on the next page, the aspects of this that are most important to clients depends on their business. Put simply, clients increasingly want their external counsel to be stewards of their own responsible initiatives.
Training
Interviewees also mentioned that some firms offer free training courses to in-house teams. This is greatly appreciated by General Counsel and Heads of Legal, especially those that have large teams.
Find out more
Standing Out from the Crowd explores responsiveness and how it could be a differentiation factor. It also explores other potential differentiators such understanding your client’s business, price, and technology. The report is particularly useful as it contains lots of real life examples that fully illustrate the findings. You can download the full report here.
