Classification - PART 1 PUBLIC

COUNCIL

5 July 2016

Classification - PART 1 PUBLIC

Purpose - For noting

DEVELOPMENT OF EDUCATION STRATEGY

Remit

The Executive Director of Membership Services is responsible for the development of the Education Strategy.

Statement of territorial application

This paper applies to England and Wales

Financial, section 51 and resourcing implications

None

Consultation with Finance

The Director of Finance sits on the project team.

Equality and diversity implications

The equality impacts will be noted within the next stages of strategy development.

Consultation

This paper has been prepared for Council, with recent consultation at Membership Board

Director: Peter Liver

Author: Peter Liver

Date: 6 July 2017

DEVELOPMENT OF EDUCATION, TRAINING AND LEARNING STRATEGY

Introduction

This paper seeks to outline the progress made so far in developing the Education,Training and Learning (ETL) Strategy for the Law Society.

1.Background

This work- stream derives from a range of activities and discussion papers submitted to the Board in recent years,not least the paper published in January 2016 ‘The Future of Legal Services. In this document we identifiedkey drivers in the legal services market which will inevitably shape our approach to ETL. In particular, the need for solicitors to expand their skills base in their pre qualification and qualification education and in areas beyond technical legal knowledge. It is a measure of the pace of change in that since that report further issues have crystallised, namely: Brexit,regulatory proposals (from SRA , CMA, FCA) and the outcome of the recent General Election.

In March 2017, the Executive Leadership Team agreed to set up a new project that would develop the strategic framework further and identify opportunities to work with like-minded organisations to increase the Law Society's scope for a more proactive strategy.

This paper was noted at Membership Board and it will be explored further during the Board’s August away day.

2.The Law Society's proposed strategic direction:

Offer leadership in the sector: Demonstrate intellectual and thought leadership by engagement, promoting debate and innovation in ETL. Identify, promote and disseminate best practice across the sector.

Extend and improve the Law Society's offer across the spectrum of life learning: Strengthen the spine of learning for all solicitors at every stage of their career. This includes:

•Pre-qualification stage: Preparing the next generation for qualification on and around the SQE within a wider curriculum to advance their careers and confront contemporary challenges.

•Life long learning: Combine structured lifelong learning and specialisation, benchmarked against SRA standards and best practise in order to create measurable impacts and behavioural change on individual and entity performance.

•Management and Leadership: Improving the productivity of lawyers through structured programs of management and leadership.

Partnership approach:Collaborate with leaders in the legal education sector to test, develop and grow high quality offers that meet our members’ needs and limits risk for the Law Society.

This approach has also been informed bymarket research with our members and those leading on training and development within law firms in 2016 and initial conversations with leaders across the sector.

3.Consultation on the Strategy

To inform and test our approach, throughout June and July, we are embarking on a further process of consultation with key groups, either individually or as a group:

•Senior Law Society membership, includingcouncil members, membership board and Education and Training committee members.

•An Innovation Advisory Group (IAG)has been established consisting of individuals who are responsible for driving culture change in legal service entities and assisting organisations to confront the issuesfacing the sector.

•Leaders in the legal sector such as managing and senior partners, HR directors, consultants, the LETG, overseas Bar Associations and global Law Schools who are already confronting the issues and members of the judiciary and bar.

•Organisations who have a track record of innovation and excellence and with whom we might potentially work.

4.Emerging focus for areas within the strategy

The consultation is helping toconfirm which specific developments to progress in the future. Whilst the consultation is not complete, we have had several discussions and areas of opportunity are emerging, which are outlined below.

5.Leadership in the Sector

For the Law Society to develop its role as a leader for the legal education sector, we must both sustain and increase our level of engagement within the sector at the highest level. We will look to create a programme of activities that includesstrategic meetings, roundtables, analysis and summits tofacilitate debate, inspire innovation and gather insight into the future drivers and challenges for the sector which can be reported to the entire membership to help them prepare for the changes that will affect their careers and businesses. Helping firms become aware for the need to change and offering them support to respond to the changes identified as key priorities in the consultation.

One of these areas already identified that requires focused engagement is strategic workforce planning. Here we will develop tools and support to both organisations and individuals to help prepare for the changing profileof the legal sector.

Opportunities for collaboration with internationally renowned legal education providers will help us both raise profile and create alliances across the globe.This will provide opportunities to learn from other organisations, share experiences and build a more diverse offering which will help the profession as a whole.

6.Extend and improve the Law Society's offer across the spectrum of learning

Support the next generation for qualification and to be work-place ready:

The Law Society wants to build its engagement with and offer support to undergraduates and trainee solicitors across all types of education and work places, encouraging the Law Society membership from the beginning of their careers. We will look to work closely with the junior lawyers division to strengthen communication and outreach to potential members.

We also want ensure that students have an accessible and cost effective support package to help them pass any qualification exam and specifically the proposed new SQE exams from 2020 proposed by SRA. To do this, we are exploring an opportunity for the Law Society to test a partnership approach with a leading legal training provider, which will inform our longer term ability to offer opportunities in this area.

As part of this strategy, we also want to understand how we can help prepare students for the work place to ensure that they are fully equipped with the wider needs of becoming a junior lawyer as the traditional pathways into the profession are changing. In the longer term, this could take the form of delivering a series of training modules, building to a higher education qualification that students take whilst studying their LPC or in the future SQE1&2.

Improve the quality of flexible, accessible training throughout a solicitor’s career:

We know there is potential to improve and refine our current training offering to significantly raise practice standards across England and Wales.

Firstly, we are devising a QA framework to apply to our existing individual and entity accreditations. The quality assurance framework will set clear standards that underpin the quality and robustness across our portfolio of accreditations as well as any education and training that we provide:

• Individual accreditations: set a clear standard and level of competence by setting out the knowledge, skills and attributes required for accreditation/delivered via training, mapped against SRA competences at the relevant threshold level.

• Entity accreditations: set out the ways of working that practices must have in place andintroduce a grading system to set the minimum standard expected (the level of quality and performance) against which firms will be measured and benchmarked.

Following the current consultation, we would like to conduct further focus groups with our members to help agree the topics where members would like to see new training provided bythe Law Society. These topics could either be offered on a standalone, modular basis or as part of an accreditation, which would strengthen our portfolio of training.

In the longer term, completion of a set number of these modules could contribute to a qualification. Two areas where members have already told us that they would like to see more training is in general business, management skills and compliance. As a result of this, we have started talking to specialists in these areas with the aim of running pilots to assess the level of demand and feasibility. The need for further training in corporate governance and management skills was endorsed by the consultation.

Increase the productivity of lawyers through structured programmes of management and leadership:

Our 2016 member needs research has also told us that senior associates and partners are looking for training and supportin their leadership and management skills. Therefore, theLaw Society is looking to adapt and extend opportunities available in the market that can bring high quality leadership programmes into our offer for members. There is a possibility that the apprenticeship levy can be used to fund certain types of Masters level courses with existing education providers. We know from the consultation that firms would appreciate opportunities on which to access and utilities their investment in the apprenticeship levy.

7.Partnership approach

Within all these opportunities, there is an appetite for partnerships with other training providers. Partners are keen to collaborate with the Law Society, and this approach will limit the capacity requirement and operational risk for the Law Society. A criteria has been proposed that ensures any new partners share the Law Society's values, are well-established and of the highest quality in their field. We will take legal and other advice on any future delivery models to ensure resilience, quality assurance andcompliance with relevant legislation.

8. Critical success factors

The consultation has highlighted a number of factors for the Law Society to consider in order for firms to take up these new training opportunities.

1. An increase in engagement and marketing is required for Members to know and understand the Law Society’s offering - many of those we spoke to were not aware of the Law Society’s current training offerings.

2.Development of the Professional Development Centre as a portal for lawyers to access all their training and development needs was seen as key. This needs to be done in collaboration with members to ensure ease of access and that a range of types of training is available.

3.Focus on improving the quality of the accreditations, all training content and the governance surrounding the creation and monitoring of all of the Society’s education and learning content is critical if we are to create trust, and compete effectively in the training market.

9.Financial, section 51 and resourcing implications (including consultation with Finance)

Initial project team and consultation activities are costed within 2017-18 budget.Investment proposals will be developed in the autumn once the strategy is approved.

10.Consultation with Finance

The Director of Finance is fully involved in the project.

11.Equality, diversity and inclusion implications

The project team have considered diversity within the approach to consultation and ensured that discussions are representative of membership. Equality Impact Assessments will be carried out at later stages of this project, if partnerships are progressed.

12.Communication implications

There are no implications relating to communications at this stage.

13.Any next steps

Following Council, Membership Board will be involved in developing the strategy further with the Executive team. Development work will continue into the autumn, with agreement for pilots with partner organisations by end of the financial year.

Annex 1: The Future of Legal Services January 2016. The Law Society of England and Wales

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© The Law Society 2017

Council 5th July 2017