Wednesday 22 February 2012

What started Trilby Misso Lawyers on the right road to success?


History records that Slater & Gordon purchased Trilby Misso lawyers in August 2011 for AUD$57M.

One news report ran...'The acquisition will be funded by a combination of cash, equity and deferred consideration.
Slater & Gordon managing director Andrew Grech says Trilby Misso is the perfect vehicle to advance the company’s long-held ambition to grow its personal injury market share in Queensland. “Trilby Misso delivers growth that would have taken us a number of years and a heavy investment to achieve organically,” he said. “It also gives us a fantastic revenue base and highly skilled and experienced practitioners.”'

Below is a potted history of Trilby Misso from it's most modest beginnings in Redcliffe, Queensland, to the point of sale, prepared by Hilton MIsso.

What follows immediately below is the text of an email sent by Hilton Misson to me once due diligence had been completed and the deal settled.

"Hi Rob
I am pleased to advise that the deal has now settled.
I have fondly recalled our history in my Report that is attached which is published in our Annual Achievements Report which has yet to be released. I thought you may be interested in reading this.
I recall the early days when I first consulted with you at Hyatt Coolum at one of your weekend Seminars.  You played an important role in our history.  You helped us a great deal in our early beginnings to monitor time and the costing and billing of it.  This helped me a great deal in understanding that through this mechanism of monitoring there were no barriers to growth.  It was then that we resolved to pursue the ambitions of greater growth.
I also recall my continuing with your guidance into your NSW network which also proved a great value in many ways.  Networking with colleagues has great value.
My personal thanks to you Rob for your guidance and contributions to the growth of our firm.  This was a great help to us in those early days when it was so hard to make that initial shift to the new ways and drag along all of the rest of the Team.
I am happy to recommend any aspiring practices to use your services. Your services were invaluable.
I also wish you every success in the future of your business,
Hilton"




Hilton's History of the firm...

It is my great pleasure (yet with a note of sadness) that I report the “End of an Era” for Trilby Misso Lawyers.

I have seen the firm develop from its original beginnings when my Dad Trilby first started practice as a Criminal Lawyer in Kandy, Ceylon, and then its humble beginnings later in Australia in a little office at Redcliffe.

When I started work with the firm in 1964, the firm comprised Dad, and one full time and one part time secretary. I have seen the firm grow to a team of nearly 160.

Trilby was a man who always aspired to help the less fortunate and strived to achieve ‘justice for all’. This has provided the foundation on which the culture, values and vision of the firm are now based. 

From the beginning, TML has pursued its mission to serve “all people” regardless of their creed, colour or race and even when they were unable to afford to pay the legal fees if there were compassionate grounds or a meritorious case.  

This led the firm to adopt the “NO WIN NO PAY” process of legal service which provided all people the opportunity to achieve justice. TML eventually became the biggest providers of service under the Legal Assistance Committee of Queensland.

(a)           The “NO WIN NO PAY” service was promoted throughout Queensland so as to ensure everyone had justice  -  no upfront cost and no personal risk of loss should their action be unsuccessful.

(b)           To achieve this TML needed to adopt a commercial approach.  What we did was:
·       Adopt a name/a brand that was strong and meaningful. We engaged consultants to advise on all aspects of the brand including the psychology of the brand so as to give a clear message of what our brand stood for.
·       Ensured that there was promotion of the brand and the brand message didn't focus on one individual or one group of individuals.
·       Pursue aggressively a state wide promotion of the brand and more particularly in our area of the strongest market prospects.
·       Facilitated 24 hours/7 day a week live client service call centres to deal with initial enquiries (a legal services first as far as I am aware).
·       Developed systems and processes to enable a uniform standard quality of service in a professional way in every matter
·       Limited the number of principal partners to four to minimise any political issues.
·       Defied the public perception of Injury Lawyers as being “ambulance chasers” through our  ‘Because we care’ campaign, our service promise to deliver on professional service every time with our unique ‘Client Service Charter’ and our good corporate citizen commitment through our generous support of local communities and our professional industry.
      We also sought to minimise complaints and deal with them at the highest level.
·         Developed a lawyer network throughout Queensland which served to not only secure for each other an ambassadorial role but also a mutual service of referrals.
·         Recognised areas that were problematic in the business which resulted in the decision to specialise in Personal Injury to focus on improving processes and service delivery and to centralise all operations to a Head Office which allowed the development of a single culture
·         Adopted a "best practice" culture in everything that we did.
Our record of achievements in recent times by the “awesome Team at TML” is a testimony to those decisions, belief and passion in the pursuit of the mission.

In the past our achievements have been too many to mention, but include:
- The first lawyers in our community to provide a true legal aid service before a Government sponsorship.
- The first to adopt a true precedent system with ‘WANG’ Word Processing and centralised Dictation System.
- Pioneering ‘NO WIN NO PAY” legal process in Injury law to provide justice for all and which was later followed by more of the profession.
In more recent times our achievements have been many, widely acknowledged and have served us very well.

These include the Telstra Queensland Medium Business Award, Hewitt Accreditation, BRW's Best Places to Work and the Australian Business Awards legal service excellence award.

Decision to go
The question has been asked why the founders have chosen to exit the business at this time?
·                We realised that we were getting older and whilst we all loved working “in it” the time had come to consider how we could best retire from the business and best secure the future for all the stakeholders of Trilby Misso.
·                As founding principal partners/shareholders we made ourselves irrelevant “in the business” to enable the team to continue to do what they had to do and so as to realise a better commercial outcome for all.
·                To facilitate a sustainable path for the future so this would not put at risk the future drive and commercial value of TML.
·                We appreciated the difficulties of financial funding in a sell down to junior partners and/or in an executive buyout because of the size of the business and its value.
·                The plan always was to keep growing the business to the national stage and to list on the Stock Exchange” as this was the best means to raise the money to grow and to fund our exit.  By doing this it would allow all of the Team to buy in and share in the ongoing success of the business,  BUT to do this at this stage given all our current circumstances would not be without future pressures/stresses and some risk to all stakeholders.  This was not in the best interests of everyone.

-                We felt the best opportunity for all the Team of TML was to effectively join forces with a National Law Firm that has all of the resources to facilitate our Mission on a broader platform to serve the community of Australia in a better and more effective way.  This will also provide greater career path opportunities for all of our team and secure a more sustainable future for Trilby Misso Lawyers.
-                Slater & Gordon provides enormous opportunities in career paths with a sustainable future both for the individual and the firm.
It is with a great deal of sadness that I leave the firm as it’s managing legal practitioner director and principal shareholder.  I have been managing partner since 1973  -  37 years and a total period of service of 46 years. My father Trilby left it to me to manage the business as he just wanted to be the lawyer for the people.  I was more driven by the wider cause and vision for the broader application of our legal services whilst following the growing need to be more commercial in the approach to the practice of the law.
I can only say “WOW” – what a great privilege and experience.  A sincere thanks to my Dad for being a great inspiration to us. To the team of Trilby Misso lawyers, the biggest thank you with deep heart-felt gratitude.  You have all played a key role in our great achievements.

A particular thanks to the executive team Graeme, Lisa, Michael Luke, Peter and Neil and all managers - you have been fantastic.

A similar accolade goes to our Board which included Chairman Ron Higham and Marketing Director Tony Hanmer.  A thank you also to our many advisers who were led by our key adviser Rob Ashley of Ashley Munro now merged with PWC.

The service by all of you has been deeply appreciated.  It has been a privilege and pleasure to be part of a great business and team.  I am sure that we will always carry that feeling with us.  I hope you are as proud of the achievements that I/we as founding partners feel.

My sincere thanks go to Bill Andrews and Nigel Munt for their support, contributions to the firm, and of course their continued endorsement of me to lead the firm as Managing Partner.

The future for all Trilby Misso team looks even more promising.  I/we wish you all the very best life has to offer in your respective future career paths.

Hilton Misso
Managing Legal Practitioner Director

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