When Perth lawyers James Steedman and Nick Stagg joined forces to start their own boutique legal practice, there was no doubt their shared legal DNA and decades of experience in the field was the rock-solid foundation they needed to build the firm from the ground up.
Together they have 60 years of combined experience at leading national and independent law firms before starting Steedman Stagg Lawyers, a dispute resolution and commercial law firm located in the heart of Perth’s CBD.
As with any business, though, they couldn’t do it alone. Before opening the doors in March 2021, Steedman Stagg engaged with Stewart Blizard and Domenic Manno, principals at business accountancy firm Insight Advisory Group.
The advisory group has taken on the firm’s financials and accounts and looks after taxation, bookkeeping and payroll, and assisted the lawyers in setting up the accounting foundations of its practice. “The relationship with Stewart and Dom is dynamic and responsive. When we need something done it’s rare that it’s more than a 24-hour turnaround,” Mr Stagg said about the relationship with Insight Advisory Group.
A cornerstone of any successful business, building trusted relationships and providing personalised advice while understanding a client’s circumstances and delivering the desired outcome is a core pillar for Steedman Stagg Lawyers.
“It’s important as legal practitioners that we develop a relationship of trust and confidence with the client. It’s the same for us using the services of Insight Advisory Group that we have the same relationship. It’s important because at times you’ve got to have tough discussions and hit the issues head on and you’ve got to have candour and frankness to get through it. That’s part and parcel of business,” Mr Stagg said.
Steedman and Stagg met when they worked side-by-side in 2009 in the Great Southern litigation for clients at different firms. It was the start of a close, dynamic and trusting professional relationship and they eventually became partners together at leading legal firm Lavan. Mr Stagg was a senior partner in Lavan’s dispute resolution and litigation team for 12 years. Mr Steedman worked for the firm for seven years and, prior to Lavan, was a partner in a boutique litigation and property practice for 15 years.
Mr Stagg’s name is known around town as one of WA’s leading defamation and media lawyers, providing external legal counsel for Seven West Media and other media entities for many years. Mr Stagg gained his legal experience and technical skills at Parker & Parker, which became leading Australian national firm Herbert Smith Freehills, for about 15 years.
In three years since opening the doors, Steedman Stagg Lawyers has grown from four people to 14, with projections to keep growing.
“As the business has gotten busier and more people have come on board, we’ve had to step up the level of advice and assistance and guidance. To have Stewart and Dom at Insight Advisory Group walking along that journey with us and having their insight and understanding and knowledge is a big thing,” Mr Steedman said.
The two lawyers have seen major transformations over their long careers in the legal profession, reflected in younger people joining the field. Mr Stagg started as an article clerk in 1995, after a few years as a journalist at The West Australian in the late 1980s. “Back then we didn’t have computers on all desks and the fastest form of written communication was a thermal fax machine,” he commented.
Mr Stagg’s big firm background has seen him act for prominent businesspeople, investors and entrepreneurs, politicians including a premier and ministers, company directors in board takeovers, large mining and oil and gas companies, doctors, lawyers, sportspeople, charities and NFPs, private schools, colleges and universities and numerous people who get caught up in the online and social media worlds.
“Technology has changed so much, and with that, there’s a change in expectation about service delivery. There’s an expectation now from clients that it’s almost an instantaneous response,” Mr Steedman said.
“Clients like coming to us because they know that when they call, Nick or me we will pick up and they’ll be dealing directly with us. You don’t always get that in the big firms. That accessibility is not always typical and is a big point of what we do.”
Going toe-to-toe with big law, Steedman Stagg Lawyers brings forward the decades of established experience in large legal firms to a boutique environment. “We’re diverse in the litigation space and we do a lot of defamation, mining law, corporate disputes, commercial disputes, inheritance and property disputes,” Mr Stagg said. “We have deliberately designed a boutique firm so we can offer personalised legal services in our core practice areas, litigation and dispute resolution, media and defamation, corporate disputes, property disputes, mining, and trusts, wills and estates.”
Passionate about the craft all these years later, the duo is striving to create a space in the legal profession that adapts for the next generation. “There’s a different environment in this place to some of the large firms. What we’re trying to do is to help develop the best practitioners and create the right culture. You’ve got to enjoy what you’re doing and enjoy who you’re doing it with,” Mr Stagg added.
Steedman Stagg Lawyers is providing a breeding ground for younger legal practitioners and freshly minted law graduates to get in on the ground floor and progress professionally, just as they both did when they started their careers. “The idea has been to build it from the ground up. We bring on casual clerks or interns, who are usually law students or postgraduate students doing a Juris Doctor with a view to potentially be taken on as a graduate,” Mr Steedman said.
“From an employee’s point of view, what they get to see in a small place like this, from the perspective of the clerks and those who are still studying, you see the entirety of how the business works. On those big ships, everyone’s got their role to play but here they get to see all matters from cradle to grave,” Mr Stagg added.
“We’re striving to create something that’s meaningful and long-lasting. We’d like to hand the reins to others and leave a legacy for the next generation to step into and continue running it with a good succession plan and a strong foundation to have real longevity.”
