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The Impact Lawyers publishes an interview with Adolf Rousand and Ignasi Costas, Co-Directing Partners of DWF-RCD. This interview and others can be found in the Survey on the internationalisation of law firms

What is the strategy you have followed when opening offices abroad? Why?

In December 2019 -and after a successful period of collaboration through an exclusive partnership agreement-, we joined DWF, a global legal business with a team of more than 4,000 professionals, with a presence in 33 locations worldwide and with which the firm shared a differential vision of law, values and similar characteristics. 

The integration was a natural step in our growth process, after a period in which we realised that we shared a similar philosophy, values and way of understanding law and the profession. Joining DWF gave us the possibility of having group infrastructure on four continents while opening the door to our partners in new markets with great potential.

How has the COVID-19 crisis affected your international growth strategy? And whatever model you have chosen, what are the biggest challenges you have faced?

Our integration took place just a few months before the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic. As happened in other law firms, this situation forced us to modify the planned roadmap in order to focus our efforts on being close to our clients and professionals, responding to their needs and adapting as quickly as possible to the new situation.

Leaving aside this exceptional situation, any integration involves the union of two gears and the need to ensure that they work in the best possible way for both our professionals and our clients. If we also take into account the fact that the integration is with an international law firm, we will have to take into account a more than likely organisational, structural and even cultural diversity, something that in our case has been an opportunity to share experiences and good practices with DWF, making the process highly enriching.

This survey was conducted through Venize Comunicación between December 2020 and January 2021.