Denmark’s Kromann Reumert strengthens London office

Danish firm Kromann Reumert has moved to strengthen its London base, relocating a partner and two associates to the City and refreshing its strategy for the office.

Partner Søren Skibsted relocated to London at the beginning of the year amid a change of focus for the London representative office, which will increasingly seek to build relationships with an industry rather than a practice area focus.

The changes come as Kromann Reumert’s previous London head, William Kanta, is leaving to become the UK CEO of Danish construction company NRE. Kanta moved to London in 2012 and was appointed as London office head in September that year.

However Skibsted is the first partner to be based full-time in London and the number of staff in the office, which now includes a recently-appointed business development manager, is the highest it has ever been.

Skibsted said the firm was investing in London in a bid to become a hub for Danish clients with interests in the UK. He said Kromann Reumert would increase its efforts in providing Danish business intelligence to both lay and law firm clients as well as referring its Danish clients to the most suitable UK firm.

Skibsted has also been spearheading a firmwide initiative to improve lawyers’ communication with clients. The project began last year and followed client feedback.

The initiative is based on the ‘Minto Pyramid’ used within the consulting industry, which structures documents based on the ‘SCQA’ principles – Situation, Complication, Question and Answer.

Kromann Reumert added ‘Recommendations’ to the model and adapted it for the legal world, giving the initiative the title of ‘SUSKA’. All staff, from partners down, attended workshops to learn how to use the model and the firm created tools to make it easier to use. Each department has a SUSKA ambassador to promote and support the model’s use.

The aim was to reduce the length of client documents with a heavier focus on strategic business advice and a single clear solution to a commercial problem or issue. Skibsted said client reaction had been extremely positive to date.

Kromann Reumert is the only Danish firm with a London office. It shares its City office space with fellow Nordic firms Thommessen and Logos, from Norway and Iceland respectively.