Multidisciplinary professional services networks

[7] They are the cooperative, command and control, ancillary practice, network and multidisciplinary partnership models.

The multidisciplinary issues first arose in the 1940s but was dealt with by the American Bar Association prohibiting lawyers working for accounting firms to represent clients before the IRS.

[8] The foundation of multidisciplinary practice began when the Big 4 accounting firms reached their natural growth limits.

The Big 4’s concept was simple: use the extensive list of clients to market non-traditional accounting services such as legal, recruitment, risk management, technology consulting, etc.

Having reached their natural limit on growth the Big 4 branched out to become multidisciplinary in legal, technology, and employment services.

Since the essential infrastructure was in place, it was thought to be relatively simple to incorporate other services into the existing network.

In Europe and South America the bar rules were not as developed as in the United States, and therefore did not restrict the sharing of revenues.

When the Big 6 began its expansion to the legal profession, it was met with fierce opposition from law firms and bar associations.

The American Bar Association established committees and taskforces to address the issue, but the problem spread outside of the United States, first to Europe but then to other countries where lawyers were not protected from this new foreign competition.

The final nail in the coffin was Sarbanes Oxley which meant that the accounting firms had to divest their consulting practices.

The primary networks are focused on tax, employment, intellectual property, insurance and immigration.