Hall sets growth targets for Professional Liverpool

THE chief executive of Professional Liverpool, John Hall, has set a target of adding 40 new member organisations to its network by the summer, bringing the total to 150.

This would be a marked improvement to the position the company was in when Mr Hall took on the role CEO’s role in May last year, when membership had dwindled to around 60.

Mr Hall, a former managing partner at law firm Bermans, had been drafted in to the organisation to help with its restructuring following the loss of North West Development Agency funding two years ago, which represented 70% of its income.

Since then, however, Mr Hall said that he and other members of the committee have worked hard to reinvigorate it by growing membership numbers to move it towards self-sufficiency and by adding more seminars, networking events and other services to improve value for existing members.

For instance, all 46 tables at last week’s No Cannes Do – the lunch event aimed at property professionals who are not attending the international MIPIM fair at Cannes – sold out within two days. Mr Hall added there were another 100 people on the waiting list for the event.

“There’s a genuine level of support and enthusiasm for Professional Liverpool,” he said.

“A lot of what we’ve been doing has been pushing at an open door. Now we’ve got to try and move up another level.”

His longer term aim is for the organisation to emulate the role that its Manchester-based counterpart, pro.manchester, has carved out for itself as the unified voice of the city’s professional services sector. He believes that
Liverpool still suffers from the fact that there are too many groups representing business interests.

“When we’ve gone out to people and asked if they think the city needs a voice for the professional and financial services sector, they say ‘definitely’.”

He added that the professional and financial services sector is the biggest private sector employer within the city, with the strongest wealth management sector outside of London represented by the likes of Rathbones, Deutsche Bank, Investec, Cheviot and Redmayne Bentley, among others.

“The sector is one we should be shouting about more than we do.”