One of Jacksonville’s first law firms has implemented the most significant change in how it operates since the two founders started the business in 1905.
Rogers Towers added to its staff a chief operating officer and a chief financial officer who are handling the business side of the firm, which has grown over the past 112 years to 55 attorneys in five offices.
“These hires are a part of a long-term strategy calculated to enable us to continue to provide our clients with the high-quality service that we are recognized for and, at the same time, deliver the level of value that the marketplace demands,” said Rogers Towers Managing Director Fred Franklin.
Thomas Birdsong, COO, came to the firm after 16 years as executive director of operations at Borland-Groover Clinic. He will oversee management, administration, information technology and marketing. He received his MBA from the University of North Florida.
Birdsong also served eight years in the U.S. Navy as a legal manager and information systems security officer.
Before she joined Rogers Towers, Chief Financial Officer Robin Simmons was the controller at the Williams Mullen law firm in Richmond, Virginia, which has more than 200 attorneys and offices in three states and in Washington, D.C.
Simmons was financial operations manager at the Media General broadcasting company before moving to Williams Mullen and received her MBA from Columbia College.
For Birdsong, it’s been a smooth transition from running the business side of a medical clinic to that of a law firm.
“It’s absolutely similar. In fact, that’s what drew me here. Borland-Groover was set up with physicians who owned the company. Our job was to make the physicians’ jobs as easy as possible so they could be a doctor 100 percent of the time.
“It’s the same approach here. We want to do everything we can for our attorneys so our attorneys can take care of their clients,” he said.
The new financial management strategy is designed to benefit the firm’s board of directors and to allow the attorneys to devote more of their time to practicing law and serving clients, said Simmons.
“We’re streamlining operations on the financial side and we’re getting more sophisticated software so we can do better analysis,” she said.
“Attorneys will have a dashboard with all their metrics. They’ll be able to see their hours and collections, which is much better than having to call accounting,” she said.
“Our focus is to take care of the attorneys so they can take care of their clients. When we do that, the rest falls into place,” Birdsong said.
The first phase of the new strategy is management and administration. The next phase will be growing the firm, possibly in terms of the number of attorneys and the range of services, such as additional practice specialties.
“We don’t want to stay as we are. We don’t have a set number, but we know that if you’re not growing, you’re dying,” said Birdsong.
Decisions will be based on sound business practices and planning, he said.
“We will go where the business is. We may have a big client that has work in other areas that loves what we do and asks us to set up shop in another area. The margins are just too narrow in this business to just randomly pick places. We will be very pinpointed,” he added.
Franklin said the goal for the first phase is for the firm to operate “in the most efficient and cost-effective manner possible.”
Then, “although we are a firm with a long, rich history, we realize that we cannot simply rely on our brand, and Rogers Towers is focused on the future,” he said.
