‘So, are you enjoying it?’ I’ve lost count of the number of times I have been asked the question since joining Legal Business last February.
The question makes me feel awkward because I’m not a positive person. I try to be but I know I’m not. But the honest answer as I pass the one-year mark is: ‘Yes, I’ve enjoyed it. So much actually that the gloomy part of myself keeps waiting for it to go wrong.’ I know of no better measure than that.
The idea in joining was simple: to renew a proud brand in legal publishing. That meant getting the title back to its analytical weight and pushing it back on the high road.
If Legal Business isn’t an upmarket title, there isn’t much point to it. So, yes, the Christmas quiz was toast before I even walked through the door.
Much of that shift in tone is about making sure that, while we focus on the core issues affecting law firms, we handle the sensitive issues that inevitably come up, well, sensitively. No cheap shots, no sneering, or nasty surprises – criticism should be constructive and the subjects of our coverage should have a decent forum to put across their viewpoint whether we agree with it or not. Use of off-the-record interviews is tightly controlled – we’re not printing a snipers’ charter. When in doubt we should give the benefit of the doubt. And Legal Business should be as focused on the many successes of the profession as when things go wrong. Inevitably, we won’t get the balance right every time but this is what we strive for and hopefully largely achieve.
Yes, the Christmas quiz was toast before I even walked through the door.
Aside from restoring the title’s heft, the obvious priority was a total overhaul of its digital platform with a new website launching in April, followed up in September with the launch of our iPad edition. As my colleagues, Stephen Jones and Kate Townsend, did the heavy lifting on the iPad edition, I feel able to say, in my biased opinion, that it’s the best of breed in legal publishing by a good distance.
There were other aims for year one, including increasing the coverage and relevance of the title to the in-house community, a process that culminated with last month’s heavily expanded GC Power List report, the launch of which was marked with a reception attended by nearly 100 in-house counsel alongside the 2014 Legal Business Awards.
It’s not for me to say if we have achieved the above aims, but the feedback I have had from contacts I trust (the kind who tell me what I don’t want to hear) is that we have had a good measure of success in the first year. But I walked in here with a long-term plan and there is, I hope, a good way to go before we push the title to its potential. Because I want to be enjoying this for a long time to come.