Junior Lawyers International Weekend, 27-29 September 2012
Nick Fluck, vice president, Law Society of England and Wales
Good morning.
It gives me very great pleasure to welcome you all to the Law Society for the start of the 2012 International Weekend.
It's wonderful to see so many of you here today, although it's less wonderful that you make me feel so very old.
When I started out as a young lawyer too many years ago to mention, both the world and the legal profession were very different places.
It was a far more insular world, with sights fixed more firmly on one's own backyard than legal markets overseas.
In the 21st Century, sights are set a little further afield.
Globalisation has broken down boundaries and opened up markets across the world.
The internet has revolutionised the way we communicate with others.
Information crosses borders and oceans in seconds, circumnavigating the globe in a blink of an eye.
In such a world there can be no splendid isolation - global is local.
No lawyer, whether in the City of London, or Lincoln (where I am from), New York, Toronto or anywhere else can afford to be passive.
The Law Society is very proud of the work that it does overseas to open new markets for lawyers in England and Wales and to promote English law, through trade missions, bilateral events and mutually beneficial relationships with our counterparts in other countries.
In fact, I'm deeply envious when I consider the opportunities before you to meet your peers from across the world, and to build friendships and professional connections, at the very start of your careers.
Experience tells us that creating these partnerships is best achieved by bringing people together, by fostering understanding and building trust, which is what we hope that you achieve over the coming days.
I am sure you have a lot to discuss.
External forces like the continuing economic downturn, technology, the growth of legal services providers, and outsourcing as well as domestic internal pressures in our jurisdiction such as a change in our regulatory framework and the potential for outside ownership of and investment in solicitors' practices are changing the shape and size of our legal services market.
It is fair to say that some of our members view these changes with alarm.
There may be some international scepticism; but I hope that you will look at the opportunities that lay before you with - if not some trepidation - excitement.
In ten or fifteen years from now the global legal services market will look different.
Trends that are just taking off now will have taken flight and be established practice.
But you wouldn't be a lawyer if you weren't creative, intelligent, hard working and blessed with the ability to come up with answers to problems.
All those qualities are needed in the legal profession right now and you are well placed to make the most of the challenges and opportunities that change will bring.
Maybe we should remember Charles Darwin's insight that 'It is not the strongest of the species, nor the most intelligent that survives. It is the one that is the most adaptable to change.'
Solicitors have always had to practise against a background of change.
Even in the relatively short time you have been studying and practising law you have probably already seen and experienced this.
Change is therefore nothing new and in many respects the dilemmas that solicitors face today are ones which the profession has always had to consider.
Competition is not a new phenomenon for any of us.
Law firms across the world have always had to be flexible, innovative and business minded in order to compete, survive and prosper, especially during economic downturns, and in order to respond to changing client demand.
Solicitors are distinguished from the growing band of unqualified self-proclaimed legal advisers by our reputation.
Our 'brand' is synonymous with quality based on innovation, expertise, excellent client service and our core values of personal integrity.
Indeed the personal and professional skills and knowledge you have attained as a solicitor will always be in demand to enable our increasingly complex society and economy to function.
Your qualification lets you pick from a wealth of areas to work in and across a diverse set of professional environments.
You may practise in-house, or in the private sector, or in national or local government, or regulatory bodies.
Or you may choose to work in the third sector, where opportunities for young lawyers are expanding fast.
You may seek higher rights of audience - and demonstrate that the skills of solicitor advocates are at least equal to those of barristers. And your career may lead you on to judicial office, or to senior executive positions in commerce and industry or in public bodies.
Furthermore, your professional ambitions know no national boundaries.
So it is my firm belief that all of you sitting here today will be able to enjoy, should you chose to, a fulfilling, diverse and rewarding career.
You can be sure, too, that the range of work you may do throughout your career is growing all the time, with more and new areas of specialisation emerging in response to legislation and global client demand.
Of course, there are challenges ahead as we fight to preserve access to justice, uphold the professional integrity of law firms and put our clients' interests first, but change brings with it opportunities for an innovative and businesslike profession such as ours.
Innovation doesn't have to be complex or expensive.
NASA soon learnt, upon first putting astronauts into space, that ballpoint pens wouldn't work in zero gravity.
The US space programme spent the next ten years and close to 753 million dollars developing a biro that would write in space, in a total vacuum and at temperatures ranging from absolute zero to over 150 degrees Fahrenheit.
The Russians used a pencil.
Sometimes the simplest solutions are the most effective.
In all seriousness, we will need to ask ourselves - how can we operate effectively and flexibly to take advantage of new opportunities and continue to deliver the same high standards that our clients have come to expect from us.
If we answer those questions well, we will enable every solicitor to reach their potential and thrive in the new legal services market.
Some firms will thrive and some will not, but there will be plenty of opportunities out there. What you choose to do with those is up to you.
One thing is sure - the demand for legal services is going to keep on growing. The key to future success lies in the way we - you - react.
I say to the new qualifiers when I conduct admission ceremonies from this platform 'there is a world of opportunity out there - go and seize it with both hands'.
And I really mean it!
Thank you for listening, and have a wonderful weekend.