John Denton has friends in high places – and as he tells ALB’s Renu Prasad, a bit of influence goes a long way in the legal profession
John Denton – or John WH Denton, as he is known on the firm’s stationery – regrets that he is unable to provide advice on architecture or urban planning matters. “There is a well-known architect also known as John Denton – occasionally I receive his calls and vice versa,” the CEO says with a grin.
“My middle names are Wallace Hope, so you can imagine I was teased a bit growing up – so these days I wear it as a badge of pride.”
For those in the legal industry, John WH Denton is a readily recognisable name. Depending on whom you ask, he’s either the myth-busting visionary challenging the industry status quo, or the mid-tier bloke with the large chip on his shoulder.
The nature of Denton’s grievances with the “big six” and entrenched perceptions of what constitutes a top-tier firm have been well ventilated in the past. Suffice to say that his views on the subject have not changed. He’s now intent on implementing a four year plan which will see the Corrs partnership expand by a third, and prime the firm for the challenges of 2015 and beyond.
That forward focus, according to Denton, is the key. “There’s a danger in business of anachronistic thinking – people running to catch up but they don’t realise that things have moved on anyway,” he says.
“The challenge is to keep ensuring that you understand your environment and to shape the firm to meet that.”
Thought leadership
While Corrs does have ambitious growth targets, the firm is likely to remain somewhat smaller than its rival national firms. But Denton does not see this is as a disadvantage. “The big six ain’t so big these days,” he says. “They don’t want to be big – they would prefer to be more the size of Corrs, but to restructure requires a lot of effort and focus and that may well be a challenge for them.”
Denton says a useful indicator of a firm’s value is not its size as much as its influence. The Corrs alumni include AGL Chairman Mark Johnson and Rod McGeoch, former CEO of the Sydney 2000 Olympic Bid. Denton himself has a high profile through his many business and community activities, which include acting as an Australian representative on the APEC Business Advisory Council and the chairmanship of the APEC Finance and Economics Working Group. “Corrs was the only law firm in the world represented at the G20 [Summit in Seoul],” says Denton. “It means we have a substantive advantage in terms of quality positioning on a global basis. Other firms would have liked to have been there, but it was by invitation only.” And who was responsible for inviting Corrs? “The president of Korea,” says Denton modestly. Presumably he is referring to South Korea, although one cannot completely rule out the possibility that he is referring to elusive North Korean head Kim Jong-il. The Denton web of influence extends far and wide.
The objective is not simply promoting the Corrs brand but becoming involved in regional issues to gain an improved understanding of the challenges facing business. “We have a tradition of being involved in the big public policy issues,” says Denton.
“That’s why we can talk about helping to drive Australia’s competitiveness and its economic engagement with Asia, because we’re actively involved in those debates. You ask clients what they’re worried about and they are asking, can the country stay competitive? How do we engage with Asia? How do we work with China? And if you don’t have fresh ideas or a perspective on those questions, you’re not listening to what your clients are worrying about.”
Asia
When the Clayton Utz bandwagon slowly creaked into Hong Kong last year, many took this as an affirmation of the principle that a law firm needs to be physically present in a jurisdiction to seriously serve its clients there. Corrs has not opened any Asia offices, but Denton maintains that this does not affect the firm’s offering. “A common misconception is that there’s only one strategy for dealing and engaging with Asia,” he says.
“There seems to be a cookie-cutter approach that unless you have an office, you’re not serious about Asia. Well I just reject that as rubbish, and having been involved most of my life deeply with matters involving Asia and international matters, I can say that a physical office is not a prerequisite for success. There’s a lot of mediocrity that operates with offices in Asia. Our aim is to be world-class.”
The key, says Denton, is a deep understanding of how Asia operates. “You can’t have relationships in Asia unless you’re substantially committed to understanding the driving forces: understanding how the peninsula operates, how Japan operates, how China interrelates, new definitions. People are starting to talk now about Indo-Asia rather than the Asia-Pacific,” he says.
“I’m bemused by the way people talk of their strategies in Asia almost as though they were akin to UK firms in Europe. With all due respect, ASEAN is not the European Union – there are some fundamental misapprehensions about the way the southern hemisphere operates and trying to apply a rule based, institutional focussed approach. It is much more about loose alliances and relationships. ASEAN does not have a lot of enforceabililty about it; APEC is kind of a notion – it joins together economies rather than countries for a start,” he says.
Lateral hires
Corrs has plans to expand its partnership by about a third by 2015, a process which is already well underway with lateral hires such as Shaun McGushin and Rommel Harding- Farrenberg from Freehills, and Jeremy King from Blake Dawson. The aim is to develop some depth in the corporate, energy/ resources, infrastructure and disputes practice areas, although the firm will remain full-service. Denton says that the push to slim down the partnerships at some of the big firms has created disillusionment. “Being part of a constant downsize is not the most exciting way to spend your time as a partner,” he says. “Whereas we have a story of growth – there’s a real sense of excitement in the place – we can see a way forward.”
Corrs itself has lost some partners in recent times, although Denton estimates that the average annual turnover is no more than about 10%. “That’s part of the natural flow – we don’t think it’s unusual. Some of it will be retirements, or moving on to something else,” he observes. But he also acknowledges that not all of the partnership has embraced the ambitious new direction of the firm.
“Once you set an objective of being a world-class law firm committed to engagement with Asia, there are some partners who will say they’re not up for that. That’s a perfectly respectable and principled decision,” he says. “We also have had partners who take the view that for their practice they want to be with a firm that has an office in China. We will have a difference about those sorts of things – I’m very respectful of partners who make those decisions.”
The new-look Corrs requires partners to be constantly available and, as Denton puts it, approach top-tier practice with the same kind of discipline as an elite athlete. It has not proven to be everyone’s cup of tea. “Some of our partners have looked at what they’re required to do, the amount of energy they’ll invest and decided it’s not for them. And that’s perfectly fine. The choices the firm makes won’t suit everyone,” says Denton.
But he maintains these are the steps which need to be taken if the firm is to become a world-class player. “We’re a challenger firm, we’re not a status quo firm,” he adds. “We don’t believe that we’re entitled to success, you have to work to achieve it on a daily basis. That doesn’t suit everyone. The market is unforgiving of those who believe the world owes them a living.”
