Sona Pancholy's goals include focusing on the voice of the client
Meritas - a global alliance of independent law firms - named Sona Pancholy as the organization’s next president.
Joining as president elect on Feb. 10, Pancholy will transition into the role of president in May - taking the reins from Tanna Moore, who has led Meritas for the past 14 years. Pancholy previously worked at Bloomberg Industry Group as senior director of law and tax content.
In her new role, Pancholy hopes to build on the strong foundation of the organization, which celebrates its 30th anniversary this year.
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“I’m developing ideas around these three areas,” says Pancholy: bringing the voice of the client to Meritas, creating a stronger culture of innovation, and enhancing collaboration across member firms.
“We’re working to focus on the voice of our clients and looking at how we really listen to them and how we incorporate their needs and expectations into the organization, both in our business strategy for growth and also in helping the firms in how they deliver that service.”
Pancholy expects to see the relationship between in-house and external counsel continue to mature as in-house departments become increasingly sophisticated and general counsel look to gain efficiencies beyond price control.
“Clients are no longer passive about the legal services they receive,” says Pancholy. “They are seeking efficiency and they are setting expectations.” Whereas 10 or 15 years ago efficiency was only about cost, Pancholy notes that in-house counsel are increasingly seeking value, and working collaboratively with law firm partners.
“What has really been changing is GCs are now asking law firms to provide a business solution and not just to give them a legal brief on an issue,” says Pancholy. “GCs are business professionals that were recruited from law firms, so they know what to expect of their service providers.”
Pancholy also wants to further develop Meritas’ strong culture of innovation that is driven by independent firms within the network, particularly in their creative ideas for going to market and delivering legal services in different ways. Among its innovative offerings, Meritas provides peer reviews for members and last year the organization implemented cybersecurity standards for all current and future member firms to follow as part of its quality assurance program.
Another goal that Pancholy wants to focus on is developing collaboration strategies between member firms which now span 259 markets worldwide.
“Members identify changing business practices and different ways they go to market, and how that’s evolving. So there is a tremendous opportunity for a network like ours to help share that information and raise the profile of best practices that are out there,” says Pancholy. “Our independent firms see the benefit in collaborating with each other as they seek to provide value to clients and share knowledge on evolving global issues.”
Pancholy will assume the role of president immediately following the Meritas 2020 annual meeting in London in May.