New Dentons CEO Barton Taps EY Experience for Growth Trajectory

Kate Barton, who left her job as Ernst & Young’s global vice chair after a reorganization plan was abandoned, faces a new test to grow one of the world’s largest law firms into an even bigger behemoth.

Barton on Sunday became chief executive officer at Dentons. She declined to outline specifics of her growth plan, but offered a view into how she plans to gain buy-in from the firm’s top revenue-generating lawyers.

“I like to use my influence as opposed to my authority,” Barton said in an interview. “I like to get things done, but I like to do them in a way that brings everyone along.”

The former EY executive replaces two leaders who built Dentons and served as its face for more than a decade. She ascends as some partners have questioned the firm’s core business model: aggressive growth through a network of affiliates, including in places considered Big Law backwaters.

As she starts a three-year term as CEO, Barton, 62, wants to implement “best practices” gained from her nearly 40 years as an EY executive, like tech solutions to reduce time on routine tasks. She expects her experience at the global accountancy will shape how she leads the 2,220-partner global firm.

“They might not 100% agree, but hopefully they’ll see why it’s good for the organization and what we have to do to get there,” she said.

EY global leader Carmine Di Sibio tapped Barton in 2022 to help lead “Project Everest,” a plan to separate its accounting and consulting businesses. The move was designed to free the consulting side, including legal services outside of the US, from conflicts rules blocking it from working with EY’s auditing clients.

The company ditched the plan in April 2023 following resistance from its US leaders. Barton and Di Sibio left months later.

“I always knew if the transaction didn’t go forward, I would leave,” Barton said. “Given my understanding of tax and law, I was valuable in putting together a lot of the consulting business, but that need disappeared when we discovered we couldn’t get it done.”

‘A More Mature Dentons’

Barton’s new firm in some ways resembles a Big Four consultancy. Its “multi-disciplinary approach” pairs legal and non-legal services across a wide geographic footprint, said David Wilkins, a Harvard Law School professor.

“If you look at a law firm like Dentons, they are trying to create a model that looks a lot more like the Big Four than Cravath, or Wachtell, or take your pick,” Wilkins said. “They’re not just trying to do the premium deals. They’re trying to provide global solutions to clients.”

Elliott Portnoy and Joe Andrew formed what is now Dentons in 2010, when their firm Sonnenschein Nath & Rosenthal combined with UK-based Denton Wilde Sapte. It formalized the Dentons name in a 2013 combination with firms in Canada and France.

Portnoy and Andrew envisioned a cohesive international marketplace for legal services. Organized as a Swiss verein, Dentons has opened offices in 80-plus countries by selling local firms on its global referral network while allowing them to maintain separate profit pools and operational independence.

Kate Barton

Photo: Dentons

Dentons has acquired offices in India, the Philippines, and Africa since 2022. It also pulled out of China, slashing its professional headcount in half to under 6,000.

As Dentons rapidly grew, dissatisfied partners in lucrative areas questioned the value of the firm’s referral network and service quality across acquired regions. Some said the firm was missing out on opportunities in major US markets by focusing elsewhere.

The strategy’s architects are no longer steering the firm. Portnoy, the previous global CEO, retired from Dentons on Sunday. Andrew relinquished his global chairman role last year, staying on as a partner as the firm eliminated the position.

“The feedback I’ve heard is to expand the practice mix and be even larger than we already are in New York, LA, and DC,” said Portnoy. “Not because we don’t have outstanding lawyers, but we’d like to have even more.”

Golden Spike

Another Dentons leader, former US CEO Mike McNamara, was ousted from his role by a firm board in 2021 amid pushback on an ambitious growth plan dubbed “Project Golden Spike.” Dentons missed its revenue targets as it continued to add lawyers in markets overlooked by competitors, such as Louisville, Kentucky and Birmingham, Alabama.

McNamara, now CEO of law firm advisory Baretz + Brunelle, declined to comment.

Two consultants familiar with the firm, including a former Dentons professional, said leaders’ prioritization of rapid growth hurt cohesion among its member regions. Some top partners outside the US have expressed dissatisfaction with the quality across regions, according to one of the consultants.

The consultants spoke on the condition of anonymity to preserve relationships with the firm.

Keith Moskowitz and Mary Wilson, leading US Dentons partners, said after McNamara’s removal that the leadership team was expanded in a “structural change” to include more revenue generating lawyers.

Barton was selected by Dentons’ talent and governance committee and approved by the firm’s global board, whose members include Moskowitz.

“We need a leader who doesn’t just look in law firm toolkits for how to enhance profitability and how to recruit and retain people,” Portnoy said. “Dentons holds EY in very high regard as an organization that trains and develops people better than most law firms, that uses technology and processes and systems in ways that enhance profitability, and allows their clients to get the best out of their people.”

Barton, a Boston College law school alum, said Dentons doesn’t have the same limitations of conflicts from an auditing segment that EY has. “Dentons is full-service law firm,” she said. “There are always conflicts, but far less than what I was used to.”