The MPF is the world's leading association of managing partners from across the spectrum of professional service firms. Our challenge is to strengthen practice management through building a partnership of equals between those involved in client service and those in practice management.
In London, HQ of the MPF, we have created an organisation that has provided top-calibre educational and networking opportunities for all its members since 1995. By introducing thought-provoking and cutting-edge best practices that are transportable from one sector to another, we are dedicated to enhancing leadership and the status of the management team. more...
The London committee has three broad objectives:
- Organise a local programme of networking events, panel sessions and discussion groups that will facilitate the MPF’s wider aims for its members.
- Orchestrate the professions in London to support high profile bodies for continued economic and social development of the region.
- Share best practice with and provide support to other UK regional and International MPF chapters.
EVENTS
Meetings are run locally in London and provide both educational and networking opportunities for managing partners and other senior members of the management team. MPF London connects the local professional services community with the wider MPF network, whilst generating real value for members closer to home. As a membership organisation, all our meetings are member only. However, those interested in joining are welcome to attend one event as our guest in order to get a feel for the Panel. See current event or download previous meeting report
Please contact MPF Executive Director, Paul Lemon if you wish to hear more about our events and/or membership.
KNOWLEDGE
The MPF collects confidential data and conducts regular surveys amongst MPs and members of the management team based worldwide. Leading consultants in strategy and leadership, appointed by the MPF Executive Committee, prepare monthly surveys on strategy and leadership issues, summarise findings, and make presentations at MPF events held in key cities worldwide (London, New York, Frankfurt etc). All findings are released for free into the public domain to ensure professional firms everywhere have access to reliable facts on key management issues. more...
CAMPAIGNS
The MPF is the most powerful lobby group in professional services, launching a new campaign every six months. MPF campaigns confront the professions on particular issues aiming to empower the management team and help connect the local professional services community into the MPF network.
Current campaigns include:
- In search of Management talent: A “prospectus” for the professions
- Time Management: MPF Management Diary - time well spent?
- Partner Career Paths: Exploring the sound of silence
- Leadership Selection: Less politics, more transparency, clear reward
- Unsung Heroes: No-one should be treated as a second class citizen
We aim to remain at the cutting-edge of business thinking in professional services through regular surveys of our members and global leaders in marketing, HR, IT, finance etc, while allowing members to canvass each other on a management issue through MPF Pulse.
AWARDS
We organise the European Practice Management Awards, the only competition to focus on the contribution of different disciplines to managing a professional firm. Widely recognised as the premier Awards in Europe for those with practice management roles, the competition has been running since 2002.
COMMITTEE
Chair: Jeremy Dutton has been Chief Executive of and a partner in Campbell Hooper Solicitors LLP since 2001 having joined as Practice Director in 2000. He previously practised as a litigation partner in Titmuss Sainer Dechert (as it then was) where he was used to a culture in which "work" was synonymous with chargeable time. After a spell on the other side of the law-firm/client table managing disputes in various parts of the world for what was then Hilton Group PLC, he returned to private practice in a management capacity. As hard-working partners occasionally unwittingly remind him, he has not done a day's "work" since. His deep interest in all things non-chargeable led him to complete an MBA (Legal Services) at Nottingham Law School.
Regional Director: Paul Lemon is Executive Director of the Managing Partners' Forum and leads regional and international growth of the network. Having spent five years in the legal publishing sector as a sales manager, Paul spearheaded an international launch and was part of the advertising team that saw Legal Week crowned Business Magazine of the Year 2001/2. With experience of working with professional firm leaders, managers, fee earners and support staff, Paul provides a key interface for the MPF network managing the relationship between regional committees, MPF Panels and the Executive.
George Bull heads Baker Tilly’s Professional Practices Group and is primarily involved in providing leading-edge business and taxation advice to the legal profession. Before joining Baker Tilly he was head of the commercial services department in a law firm where he was involved in strategic decision-making as well as day-to-day management. He therefore has an understanding of strategy issues both from the perspective of an in-house management team and as an external client adviser. George is an approved Lexcel consultant to the Law Society in England and Wales, a member of the International Bar Association and an Honorary Member of the Law Management Section of the Law Society. He has recently been appointed to the Committee of the Solicitors’ Special Interest Group of the ICAEW.
George regularly broadcasts, lectures and writes on all aspects of professional practices.Gavin Ingham Brooke is Managing Director of Spada, a comprehensive communications, marketing and change management agency. Clients include global corporations, national and international law and accountancy firms, banks and specialised financials services providers, professional membership organisations and real estate interests.
Nick Carter-Pegg has been advising professional services firms for over 20 years and is currently the Head of Professional Services Group at BDO Stoy Hayward. His clients include architects, law firms, property consultants and surveyors, management consultants and recruitment consultants.
David Izett joined Conrad Ritblat in April 1994 as a director in the retail Division and the following year became head of the In Town Retail Department. He was appointed Managing Director of the Company in 2001. David is a Director of Colliers International Property consultants Inc. he is joint Chairman of Colliers EMEA and a member of the International Governing Committee of Colliers International. He is Chairman of Colliers Real Estate SL and Colliers Jackson-Stops, the Group's Spanish and Irish subsidiaries. David is a member of the British Council of Shopping Centres advisory committee and is on the London committee of the managing Partners Forum. David also sits on the Wicoms advisory board.
Margaret Mannell - Having built aircraft carriers and other things in between, Margaret Mannell found her home in the law. She spent fifteen years as "headmistress" of Taylor Wessing before joining U.S. firm, Morrison & Foerster, in the summer of 2005. At MoFo, as the firm is affectionately known, her job title is "Director of Administration", and her responsibilities include herding cats, fire-fighting and tight-rope walking. Answering to several masters in many time-zones, she works with a dynamic group of partners and administrative staff who are focused on developing Morrison & Foerster's European practice.
Amanda Phillips is Director of AP Consulting an Executive & Organisational Development consultancy. Amanda was a member of the Global Partner and Leadership Development team at PricewaterhouseCoopers, and also held operational HR roles providing strategic consultancy and advice to senior leaders. She has worked extensively in professional services and in other sectors including Banking, Technology and Telecoms, Media, Education and Health Care. Amanda was the external examiner for London’s South Bank University Masters Degree in Human Resources for a number of years. She is also Coaching Supervisor for the Oxford Brookes Masters Programme in Coaching & Mentoring Practice.
Sacha Romanovitch, Office managing partner, London EBS, Grant Thornton
Laurie Young is a management consultant and author of ‘Marketing the Professional Services Firm’. He was global marketing partner of the corporate finance division of PricewaterhouseCoopers. During his career he has set up and run large marketing, sales & account management teams in several leading service firms. He has also worked on repositioning some of the world’s leading brands. In recent years he has transferred his knowledge to the professions running seminars and creating programmes around both personal and organisational business development techniques.
DETAILS OF OUR NEXT EVENTS
Maintaining high margin work
Davis Langdon, Mid City Place, 71 High Holborn, London WC1V 6QS
Tuesday 14 July 2009
All firms have high margin clients. Increasing your share of such work is a holy grail as it usually leads to high profitability and personal reward, intellectually satisfying technical issues to resolve, quality clients, access to top talent when recruiting, and an engaged workforce.
However, the recession, the rise of professional procurement and a drive for commoditisation centered on new technology are just some of the pressures that are currently forcing firms to sacrifice hard-won margins. Our speaker, Laurie Young, will be drawing on his extensive research to explore the key elements that high margin firms share in common: reputation management; a distinct franchise; originating influential ideas; fame and mystique; and a strong heritage.
About our speakers
Laurie Young is a management consultant and author of ‘Marketing the Professional Services Firm’. He was global marketing partner of the corporate finance division of PricewaterhouseCoopers. During his career he has set up and run large marketing, sales & account management teams in several leading service firms. He has also worked on repositioning some of the world’s leading brands. In recent years he has transferred his knowledge to the professions running seminars and creating programmes around both personal and organisational business development techniques.
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The Public Interest in Peril? British Professions - The State of the Sector
Bircham Dyson Bell, 50 Broadway, London, SW1H 0BL
Thursday 30 July 2009
“Public Interest in the Professions”, a report produced by independent consultancy Spada in association with RICS (Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors), the Law Society and CIMA (Chartered Institute of Management Accountants), is the first research of its kind into the professional services sector. It examines the professions’ true scale and public importance, factors which have often been missed by policy formulators.
Some of the report’s findings were considered important enough for Sir Michael Snyder to adopt them as a central section of HM Treasury’s recent Professional Services Global Competitiveness Paper.
Our speaker, Gavin Ingham Brooke, will discuss the report and its conclusions. He will propose how some of these issues may be addressed so as to foster better understanding of the sector and more effective engagement between the professions and other core representative groups within society.
We shall also be joined by representatives of the professional bodies for an open forum debate on the key issues emerging.
About our speaker
Gavin Ingham Brooke heads Spada, one of the UK's premier issues-based communications and research consultancies. Spada advises professional services, financial services, property and complex know-how organisations. Founded in 1994, Spada has twenty consultants in London, associate offices in New York and Washington, and a network of approximately 50 associates across the UK and Europe. Gavin Ingham Brooke has been active in the legal and wider professional services sector since 1988.
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