Delivering ‘effortless experience’ across borders: Managing internal consistency in professional service firms

Abstract

This article explore s how professional service firms manage across borders. When clients require consistent services delivered across multiple locations, especially across borders, then firms need to set up an organization that is itself sufficiently flexible to be able to support such consistent service delivery. Our discussion is illustrated by the globalization process of law firms. We argue that the globalization of large corporate law firms primarily takes place in terms of investments in the development of protocols, processes and practices that enhance internal consistency such that clients receive an 'effortless experience' of the service across multiple locations worldwide. Over the longer term the ability to deliver such effortless experience is dependent upon meaningful integration within and across the firm. Firms that achieve this are building a source of sustainable competitive advantage.

Knowing your boundaries: Integration opportunities in international professional service firms

“…Our empirical investigations involve different business models in two mature IPSFs that serve both local and global markets. Service customization is still important for these ISPFs, even though they are delivering globally integrated services (Brock & Powell, 2005;Faulconbridge, 2008;Segal-Horn & Dean, 2009). Our study provides insight into how IPSFs balance local responsiveness and global integration in the focal firm (SegalHorn & Dean, 2011).…”

“…industry deregulation, technological developments, and increased globalization) have led to an internationalization of PSFs (Brock, Powell, & Hinings, 1999;Flood, 1995;Greenwood & Lachman, 1996;Segal-Horn & Dean, 2007). IPSFs are able to integrate some of their service offerings globally (Boussebaa, 2009;Faulconbridge, et al, 2008;Segal-Horn & Dean, 2009). Their multidisciplinary practices often lead to a portfolio of services with different underlying business models and, thus, opportunities for global integration to achieve economies of scale.…”

“…Seeking to exploit its human capital in new markets, the firm becomes international (Hitt, et al, 2006), leading to increased internal differentiation in the business models delivered by the PSF. Clients also require an 'effortless experience' of professional services across multiple locations worldwide, which increases the need for the global integration of international professional services (Segal-Horn & Dean, 2009).…”

“…Many IPSFs follow a transnational strategy (Brock, 2006;Faulconbridge, 2008;Miozzo, et al, 2012;Segal-Horn & Dean, 2009, 2007. However, we have scant knowledge on how these firms can balance the quest for global integration and local responsiveness.…”

“…Professional services are generally considered to be difficult to standardize (Løwendahl, 1997;Maister, 1993) since knowledgeable individual local experts are central to what these firms offer. Nevertheless, an increasing number of professional service firms (PSFs) are internationalizing and, thereby, gaining scale advantages (Boussebaa, 2009;Brock, 2006;Brock & Powell, 2005;Faulconbridge, Beaverstock, Muzio, & Taylor, 2008;Greenwood & Empson, 2003;Hitt, Bierman, Uhlenbruck, & Shimizu, 2006;Segal-Horn & Dean, 2009, 2007. Our empirical investigations involve different business models in two mature IPSFs that serve both local and global markets.…”