September 29, 2006
Benchmarking Services by Redwood Analytics
Competitive intelligence and specifically peer group benchmarking has been growing in importance as law firms increasingly adopt traditional business practices. This post is one of several summarizing information garnered from the September 2006 Benchmarking Symposium held in Nashville, Tennessee.
Redwood has secured a lead position in business and competitive intelligence among BigLaw since it arrived on the scene in 2003. The company originated automatic benchmarking services. Focusing on AmLaw 200 firms, Redwood has 125 participating firms and provides both macro-level comparisons as well as custom peer and segment groups. Redwood is somewhat unique in that it approaches the comparisons from the view of what it refers to as Client Investment. Under this approach, Redwood tracks what happens to fee revenue—what portion goes toward categories of write-offs, expenses, and income. Tracked metrics include realization, growth, lawyers statistics, pricing, business development and profitability among other items.
During Redwood’s presentation at the recent Benchmarking symposium in Nashville, Norm Mullock, chief development officer, gave the following reasons as support for benchmarking:
- Source of comparative and trend information for the legal industry
- Support for business strategies and initiatives
- Offers a facet of the catalyst required for change
- Unbiased, quantitative assessment of internal operations
- Analytic insight into area of risk or opportunity not normally reported by the firm
- Speaks to a larger audience and from a different viewpoint than internal firm reporting
- Supports BI/CPM infrastructure
The role of benchmarking in a firm’s efforts to improve financial performance is illustrated in Redwood’s Performance Cycle graphic:
For more about Redwood’s services visit their web site. Other benchmarking providers speaking at the symposium included Juris, Inc., PriceWaterhouseCoopers and CitiGroup Private Bank. Juris Insight service is targeted at midsized U.S. law firms. Redwood, PWC, and CitiGroup are primarily targeted at the largest 250-attorney to 300-attorney law firms.
Morepartnerincome.com is sponsored by Juris, Inc. For information about Juris® products and services for increasing law firm performance and partner income, go to www.Juris.com.
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Filed under Benchmarking by Tom Collins