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Clifford Chance's PEP slides to £733,000 at end of turbulent year

In response to the previous post, there are a few good reasons why support staff in litigation departments are often short of work: litigation teams are involved in a lot less pitching than corporate/commercial and finance teams. But, for political reasons, litigation partners want the same size of fiefdom as their corporate colleagues. I know of one marketing exec at a major City firm (not CC) who was reduced to pleading with her partners for something to do, before she gave up and left. The equivalent people in other departments are often working stupid hours to get through their workloads. So this sort of problem is a management issue with its roots in the partnership structure - investment banks, I imagine, find it easier to run a leaner ship because they can allocate resources to where they are needed without worrying so much about putting backs up in the process. (Of course, this isn't to say they always get it right - bulge bracket banks as exemplars of efficiency and frugality... hm...) Anyway, as for CC, it will bounce back. For me, though, the really surprising fact to emerge from this article is that only 8 percent of its revenue comes from Asia. I'd always thought CC's Asian practice was stronger than that. That and the fact that, although its US practice is still shakey, it has a stronger presence in Latin America than its magic circle rivals, and had done a better job than A&O of diversifying away from finance, led me to think it had quite a coherent strategy. Now I'm less sure. Opening in Kviv - one of the more troubled countries of the CEE - when Linklaters has decided it can run its operations in the region from a small number of hubs is odd too. Perhaps its time for a more far reaching review of strategy.

3-Jul-2009

11:03 am