Firm Facts and Professional Profiles

D.1 Practice information register

Create one record for each practice within a named legal entity. Link separate records where service scope or authorization differs by market. Give practices, people, credentials, and individual claims stable IDs so a name change does not break their history.

Register template

Keep office presence, service coverage, and professional authorization distinct. Describe partner or network capabilities with the responsible entity identified. A relationship alone does not establish that every member delivers the same services.

For numerical claims, retain the calculation. Define whether a team count includes affiliates; deduplicate people across practices. Calculate experience from documented dates without adding overlapping employment periods. Use a dated founding statement where that avoids an annually changing claim.

Claim and evidence record

For each consequential claim, complete:

[Claim ID; linked entity/person/practice; exact proposed wording; scope and qualifications; evidence reference; evidence owner; source date; effective period; date checked; verifier; unresolved questions; approved wording; approver/date; permitted uses; publication locations; next review].

Separate evidence of accuracy from permission to publish. An engagement file may support a project description while client identification remains unapproved. Retain the permission’s scope, wording, channels, and expiry or withdrawal conditions.

Use source material appropriate to the claim: organizational records for entity details, delivery records for services and roles, issuer records for credentials, and documented measurements for outcomes. Record conflicting evidence instead of choosing whichever source supports stronger copy.

Illustrative entry: “The practice provides procurement strategy and supplier negotiation support to manufacturers in [market].” Link the service owner’s confirmation and relevant delivery evidence. List implementation or managed services only if separately supported and approved.

D.2 Professional biography template

Maintain an internal profile record and derive public biographies from its approved fields. Preserve the same factual scope across short biographies, full profiles, proposals, and directory entries.

Internal profile record

Public biography template

[Full name] is [accurate title] at [firm/entity], working in [practice]. [Name] advises or supports [client types/sectors] on [specific services or decisions], with experience in [supported areas].

At [firm], [name] has [accurately described role in representative work]. [Where relevant: Before joining [firm], [name] worked at [previous employer], where [supported responsibility or contribution].] Selected experience includes [approved example with context, role, and qualified outcome].

[Name] holds [exact degree or credential] from [institution/issuer]. [Where applicable: State the verified professional status, jurisdiction, and necessary qualification.] [Optional: approved publication, professional activity, or language capability.]

Contact: [Professional contact route]. Related practice: [Link].

Delete optional sentences that lack evidence. For a short version, retain the current role, principal services, and essential qualifications; shortening must preserve relevant limitations.

Experience and attribution rules

Use verbs that match the person’s contribution: “supported,” “analyzed,” “managed,” or “led.” Distinguish a project’s total result from the individual’s attributable contribution. Attach baselines, measurement periods, and limitations to quantitative outcomes.

State when work occurred at a previous employer. Record that experience under the individual’s history; any claim that the current firm delivered the work needs separate support. Attribute an acquired practice’s history to the appropriate entity and period.

A subject’s confirmation supports personal history but does not replace credential verification or evidence for claimed outcomes. Publication approval for a named client, testimonial, or matter description must be recorded separately.

Sector prompts for the biography writer

Avoid unsupported rankings or superlatives. An award entry should identify the awarding organization, recipient, category, and year; retain evidence and any conditions affecting the permitted wording.

D.3 Credential checks

Verify the exact claim being proposed, including who holds the credential and what it establishes. Keep degree attainment, membership, certification, registration, and authorization to practise separately identified.

Use the relevant issuer or regulator. Examples of verification routes include NASBA’s CPAverify, which publishes licensing data supplied by Boards of Accountancy; the SRA’s register of the people and law firms it regulates; and NCEES’s directory linking to engineering licensing boards. These examples do not cover every profession or jurisdiction. 

Credential verification record

Verification procedure

1. Identify the holder. Match the person or entity using appropriate identifiers. Investigate namesakes, trading names, and name changes before accepting a result.
2. Check the right authority. Confirm that the source addresses the credential and jurisdiction claimed. Follow an authoritative directory to the underlying regulator when further confirmation is needed.
3. Record what the evidence establishes. Preserve the source’s exact status and dates. A historical certificate may establish past attainment while leaving current status unresolved.
4. Resolve scope. Check relevant service, discipline, jurisdiction, and restrictions. Where practice authorization is claimed, obtain the designated professional reviewer’s confirmation that the wording is supported.
5. Handle gaps explicitly. “Not found” is a search outcome. Check identity, coverage, spelling, and source availability; seek issuer confirmation before drawing a conclusion.
6. Approve precise wording. Record factual verification and permission to publish separately. Membership alone is insufficient evidence for an additional claim of practice authorization.
7. Schedule maintenance. Set review timing around expiry, renewal, role changes, and the consequence of an inaccurate claim. Record the decision even when no public amendment is needed.

Internal verification decisions

These are internal decisions. Store the issuer’s status separately. A verified credential does not validate every service or outcome claimed elsewhere in the profile. A renewal application or payment receipt should not be treated as proof of renewed status unless the relevant authority’s evidence supports that conclusion.

D.4 Change records

Record changes at the claim level and identify every dependent publication. Keep the fact’s effective date separate from when the firm learned of, checked, approved, and published the change.

Change record template

Event and review triggers

Assign a review interval to each record according to how quickly it can change. As an illustrative starting point, review active practice facts quarterly, reconfirm biographies every six months, and check credential claims before first publication and around relevant renewal dates. Event-triggered reviews take precedence over the calendar.

Publishing and closing a change

Verify the proposed wording, approve it, and update the controlled record. For a material inaccurate claim already in use, assign an immediate correction or temporary withdrawal while the review proceeds.

Maintain a destination log:

[Change ID; destination/version; controlled or external; required action; owner; due date; status; evidence checked; follow-up].

Use distinct statuses: awaiting action; updated and checked; external request outstanding; unavailable to verify; no longer applicable. A submitted directory correction remains outstanding until verified. Preserve archived materials with dates and appropriate historical context; retire obsolete files from active distribution.

Check visible copy, linked profiles, downloadable assets, and structured data where used. Regenerate translations and shorter biographies without widening the claim. Record a genuine review date separately from a substantive update date.

Close the work under the firm’s control when the affected claims are corrected or withdrawn and their dependent assets are checked. Keep external corrections on an owned follow-up list. Retain previous versions, evidence, approvals, and unresolved exceptions according to the firm’s retention arrangements.

Illustrative change record

Change: A practice leader leaves on [date]. Evidence: Confirmed role-end record. Action: Update the biography’s status, leadership references, team lists, and public contact route; reassess capabilities that depended on that person. Retain properly attributed historical work. Completion: Main pages and active proposal templates checked; one external directory request remains open with an owner and follow-up date.

Update Part C’s reference-fact version with the approved change. Preserve the inputs used in earlier assessments. Judge historical answers against facts valid at their observation dates; if corrected evidence changes an earlier assessment, retain its original score and record the reason for revision. Log later answer observations separately from publication changes.