The Novak Druce Centre for Professional Service Firms conducts research into the internal and external dynamics of professional service firms. Although our primary focus is on the management of such firms, and the issues faced by people working within them, the Centre is also concerned with the governance of professional service firms more generally, addressing policy issues of concern to both clients and regulators. Below is an overview of our research portfolio.
- History and evolution of PSFs - impact on business and society, basis of competition, process of entry into new markets for professional work
How and when do new professions emerge? What cyclical patterns can we observe in the evolution and influence of PSFs? How do PSFs limit competition from firms within rival professions? Have international differences among PSFs become greater or lesser over time? Can nations compete in the creation and promotion of PSFs? What role do professionals have in the modern state? How have professionals influenced the growth and development of their client organisations? How has the social construction of expertise redefined the concept of professionalism?
- Nature of professional work - development of new practices, dynamics of multinational and multidisciplinary collaboration in PSFs
How do firms develop and sustain new practices to respond to client demand? How do they reconcile the need for entrepreneurial innovation at the individual level with the need for strategic consistency at a firm-wide level? How are the skills required of professionals changing? How do multinational PSFs develop cross-national capabilities? How do PSFs reconcile alternative practices on a cross-national basis? What problems arise in cross-national teams and how can they be reconciled? When does it make sense to go global and when should PSFs stay local?
- The distinctiveness of professional firms as an organizational form and the impact of this distinctiveness on strategic processes
How do clients select PSFs? How do professional firms develop distinctive and sustainable competitive positions particularly give the rapid commodification of much professional expertise? What role does reputation play in developing and maintaining a competitive strategy? How are professional elites (e.g. the 'Magic Circle' of UK law firms and the 'Wall Street' investment banks) created and sustained? Why have these elite groups survived in the face of intense competition and what might lead to their destruction? How do PSFs' reputations affect the commitment of their employees?
- Strategic change in PSFs – processes of innovation and change
How does innovation occur in professional organizations? What role do internal pressures play in knowledge based innovation and what roles do clients, professions, regulators and other external parties play? What approaches to change management are likely to be most effective when leading professionals? How do leaders of PSFs use power to influence the change process?
- Offshoring and outsourcing professional work – new organisational structures and systems
How have the organisational structures and systems of PSFs evolved and become disseminated across professions? What trends can be observed in the outsourcing and offshoring of professional work as large firms disaggregate their activities and create joint ventures and other forms of collaboration? How do the distinctive features of the professional organization affect these processes of disaggregation and reorganisation?
- Development and management of professional expertise and ethics - social and formal processes by which these are nurtured and regulated
How is knowledge shared within and between PSFs? What role do professionals play in ethically dubious activities and white collar crime? How can traditional concepts of professionalism be reconciled with commercial goals and pressures? What role do professionals play in the development and dissemination of management ideas and fashions?