Read John Hayes's First Substack Article – "How To Run a Law Firm: Part One – Be Generous"

I started Constantine Law almost 10 years ago as a sole practitioner. We have recently hired our 29th lawyer. In our first year, the firm’s billings (which were entirely my own) were £360,000. This year, Constantine Law will turn over between £7–8 million.

We are now one of the UK’s leading employment law boutiques and are ranked in both the Senior Executive and Employer sections of Chambers.

People occasionally ask me, “How did you do it?” Over recent months, I have reflected on that question. In this series, I will share some of the lessons I have learned while building a modern law firm. These are not academic theories; they are observations from the coalface.

The first lesson is simple:

Be generous.

This principle sits at the heart of almost every important decision we have made.

When I speak to founders of smaller firms who ask how we have built a business of our scale, I often ask about their support infrastructure. What technology do they use? What operational support do they have? What investment have they made in the systems that enable lawyers to perform at their best?

The answers frequently surprise me.

Too many firms see investment in infrastructure as a cost rather than an enabler of growth. Some lack the resources to invest. Others have the resources but prefer to maximise short-term profit. In my experience, that is often a false economy.

I recognise that I have been fortunate. My wife has always had a successful career of her own, which reduced some of the financial pressure when I launched the firm. Not everyone has that advantage.

However, I have also known founders in similar circumstances who made very different choices. They chose to extract profits rather than reinvest in their businesses. That is why I believe generosity is not simply a financial position; it is a mindset.

This is an extract from John Hayes’s first Substack article, “How to Run a Law Firm: Part One – Be Generous”, which you can read in full here. John writes a monthly series documenting the challenges he’s faced in scaling Constantine Law to become one of the UK’s leading employment boutiques, sharing his guiding principles and the lessons he’s learnt along the way.