About LawNet

Founded 30 years ago and based in Leamington Spa, LawNet is a member owned national network of law firms. LawNet’s aim is to ensure that its members stay ahead of their competition, offer a high quality service to all clients, reduce costs and improve profitability.

LawNet provides a range of services to member firms including training courses, marketing and business development support, quality accreditation, discounts with a variety of different service providers and access to the legal sector’s largest professional indemnity insurance scheme.

Programme outcomes

We wanted to provide learning on the aspects of law firm leadership and management that we and our members felt mattered most, particularly at new and aspiring partner and manager level. This was identified as a key step to support them to deliver their business plans in a changing landscape, and to underpin succession plans.

Partnership approach

Working in partnership with Sweetmans, we co-designed an intensive two-day off-site residential leadership and management development programme for this group.

Now in its fifth year, the programme responds to the challenges and opportunities faced by new and aspiring law firm partners, and builds on current themes and trends from our annual conference. It has evolved in response to input from senior leaders at our members, as well as valuable feedback from past delegates.

Its purpose is to inspire, and enable, the group to lead and manage on a day-to-day basis in a way that supports their firm’s strategy, and which is authentic to them as individuals.

Programme overview

The programme is based around the Insights Discovery psychometric tool (which is woven through the two days), bite-size training sessions, facilitated workshops, real-life practical activities, peer mentor sessions and personal action plans. 

Success measures

An average of 77% of delegates were promoted to a partner or equivalent role within 18 months of enrolling.

Level 1 and 2 Evaluation – End of programme

• 80% rated the programme as excellent
• 80% would “definitely” recommend it to colleagues
• 80% rated it as excellent in providing the knowledge and skills to improve their day-to-day work

Level 3 and 4 – One year later

• 100% rated it as an ‘excellent’ management development programme
• 100% are ‘highly likely’ to recommend it to colleagues
• 50% are applying their learning ‘always’, the remaining 50% ‘frequently’
• 75% found it extremely useful in satisfying L&D regulatory requirements
• 100% said it was extremely, or very, useful to attend during the pandemic