Thomson Reuters’ ALB has highlighted the top 15 Chinese law firms in 2023 that have overcome these challenges and achieved growth through improved service quality and efficiency, as well as by exploring new opportunities.
According to ALB, Beijing JAVY Law Firm is among the fastest growing firms that achieved growth in the number of lawyers, the number of offices and business turnover in the past 12 months. "The past three years saw our rapid development amid the outbreak and resurgence of the pandemic. JAVY created new opportunities despite the crisis, forged new grounds amid fluid situations, and achieved excellent results on multiple fronts," says Cao Chunfang, deputy director and founding partner of JAVY.
JAVY registered a year-on-year increase of 60 percent in its number of lawyers and staff to reach nearly 400, and added offices in Shanghai, Chongqing, Fuzhou, Nanning and Zaozhuang, with preparations ongoing for establishing presence in Tianjin, Taiyuan, Wuhan, Shenzhen and Hangzhou. In March this year, the firm rented a new building for its Beijing headquarters, doubling its office space to nearly 6,000 square meters in two detached buildings. "This has improved not only our work environment, but also our overall service capability and comprehensive strength."
Ms. Cao says that the restructuring of the firm to a SGP in 2021 is a key milestone in the firm’s development and provides the institutional guarantee for its rapid growth. "SGP solves the worries of partners in terms of liability sharing, creating the basic conditions for all partners to build a business platform together." On this basis, JAVY has made it clear in its first "Five-year Plan" that it will transition from a specialized boutique firm to a large-scale, one-stop firm.
At the management level, JAVY has established a system comprising "discussion, decision-making, execution and supervision". Ms. Cao shared that “discussion” aims to reflect democracy in its broadest and most sufficient sense. The firm has set up an executive committee, an organizational strategy and development committee, an institutional development and coordination committee, and a partnership affairs committee, to study major issues that emerge out of the firm’s operations and management. Before decisions on major matters that affect the firm are made, all employees are organized to participate in internal consideration, communication, discussion and research. "Decision-making" is to improve the democratic decision-making mechanism featuring democratic discussion and voting. JAVY practices three-tier decision-making partner meetings, namely meeting of all partners, meeting of senior equity partners, and meeting of the partner management committee.
Further, "execution" is to step up implementation efforts. At JAVY, the partner management committee elects the managing partner upon discussion who is responsible for organizing and coordinating decision-making studies, managing the relationship among partners, performing executive functions, and reporting to partner meetings at all levels. Finally, "supervision" refers to the oversight of decision-making and implementation by partner meetings at all levels and special supervisory bodies.
On the other hand, JAVY focuses on business complementarity, market demand and cultural compatibility before deciding to open a new branch. "In terms of business complementarity, the firm to be merged have expertise in different practice areas or different client resources to achieve more comprehensive service coverage; in terms of market demand, the firm to be merged share a common understanding and similar strategic thinking so as to better jointly grow market share; and in terms of cultural compatibility, the firm to be merged have values, teamwork culture and management style that are consistent with JAVY to ensure synergies and a good working atmosphere after the merger,” says Cao.
"In addition, in some firms, partners of a branch office will not be able to become partners of the headquarters. As a result, they have neither decision-making power nor voting rights. JAVY, on the other hand, requires branch office partners to be registered as headquarters partners. After being promoted to senior equity partners, they can not only participate in decision-making, but also share the distribution of the surplus of common revenue and expenditure.”
Furthermore, partners of a JAVY office who have participated in its establishment preparation are free to choose to practice with the headquarters or the branch office. "In addition, we have achieved integration between the headquarters and local offices in terms of branding, training and business leads. The headquarters and local offices share brand reputation and training resources. The former will pass down some business leads to the latter, while the latter can also choose to work with the former according to business needs."
Cao says that JAVY will always remain clearheaded and keep its original vision in mind. "In the next step, we will spare no effort to achieve the strategic goal of becoming a large national firm in accordance with the goals set in our first Five-year Plan. Specifically, we will spend three years to further innovate work ideas and management measures, and improve the construction of the national legal services network, to make JAVY a well-known national firm where the number of lawyers and the number of elite lawyers both rank among the highest across the country. Further, in five years, we will establish a service network with global coverage and become a global firm.”
© Beijing JAVY Law Firm Beijing ICP Registration No. 18018264-1