A note to our readers: The second installment of “The Reptilian Brain” appears in our August issue.

There’s a sticky issue that comes up frequently as we work with our clients to develop brand strategy—how to define a national practice. In theory, a precise definition shouldn’t matter much, but actually the wrong answer can derail a crisp brand message, lead the firm to murky brand waters, reduce the effectiveness of the brand and dramatically increase the costs of achieving brand recognition.

We want to begin with a proposition:

• If you and your firm are located in Chicago and receive a call from California for work to be performed in California and you’ve had no prior business relationship with the prospect, you have a national practice.

• If you and your firm are located in Chicago and your Chicago client takes you to California because they trust you and are happy with your work, congratulations, you have a loyal client. But you do not have a national practice.

A national practice is national in reputation.

In other words, just because you travel all over the country at the behest of your clients does not mean you have a national practice. It means you have a lot of frequent flyer miles. You can lay claim to a national practice when your reputation for your expertise and sagacity has extended beyond the natural boundaries of a region (city, state or multi-state economic cluster).

David Boies has a national practice; Skadden has a national (even international) mergers and acquisitions practice; Wilmer Hale has a national SEC investigations practice. Obviously the list could go on and on because many accomplished individuals and many accomplished firms have national reputations.

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