A brief history of where we have come from and our journey ahead including our Blick Rothenberg values and what makes us different
History, values and purpose
In my role as CEO, I hope that I can give our people the same opportunities and support that have been afforded to me, and my own measure of success will be to see people develop their careers beyond mine.
Nimesh Shah
CEO
View Nimesh's profile
Blick Rothenberg – Our history
Blick Rothenberg was founded in 1945 by Helmut Rothenberg OBE, who successfully re-built a life in London from Germany after World War II.
Together with Bernard Blick, a specialist in insurance, the firm started life on Copthall Avenue – now home to the Institute of Chartered Accountants in England and Wales.
The firm has developed a great deal over the years and whilst we act for a number of UK businesses and individuals our continental origins continue to be reflected in the international breadth of our clients and services to this day.
Our evolution
- 1945 – Blick Rothenberg founded by Helmut Rothenberg OBE
- 1945 – Acquired first premises on Copthall Avenue, London
- 1945 – Total fee income £2,061, bills issued 56, number of clients 36
- 1946 – Our first ever employee, a secretary, joined the firm
- 1946 – Henry Rothenberg (Helmut’s brother) joined as a partner
- 1947 – Our first professional member of staff, Phil Phillips joined the business
- 1949 – Bernard Blick established a separate general insurance broking business
- 1960s – Manchester Chartered Accountant Eric Noble joined the firm and we became Blick Rothenberg & Noble
- 1966 – Helmut Rothenberg’s son David joined the business
- 1968 – Henry Rothenberg died tragically aged just 51, at the height of his career
- 1977 – Helmut Rothenberg’s son Bob joined the firm
- 1989 – Helmut Rothenberg retired as partner, the firm became known as Blick Rothenberg again, and Helmut remained a consultant of the firm until his death in 2003, aged 88
- 2012 – Blick Rothenberg relocated to our current premises at Covent Garden and became incorporated as an LLP
- 2016 – In October, private equity firm HgCapital established CogitalGroup, through which it acquired Blick Rothenberg
- 2017 – Bob Rothenberg remained the firm’s senior partner until February 2017
- 2017 – Acquired Shelley Stock Hutter in December 2017
- 2018 – Acquired Westleton Drake in July and Hazlems Fenton in November
- 2019 – Acquired Rees Pollock in September. The firm continues to expand becoming part of CogitalGroup. The firm has over 60 partners and directors and over 600 people
- 2020 – Nilesh Shah retires as CEO and is succeeded by Nimesh Shah
- 2020 – CogitalGroup rebrands as Azets
- 2021 – The Rees Pollock brand is retired and the team is fully integrated under the Blick Rothenberg brand
- 2021 – July – Blick Rothenberg becomes an independent member of Allinial Global
- 2023 – All of Blick Rothenberg departments and services are brought together under one roof at Great Queen Street
Part of Azets
As noted above, since 2016 Blick Rothenberg has been a part of what is now known as the Azets group. A significant majority of the economic interest in Blick Rothenberg is held by investment funds managed and operated by Hg Capital. The balance of 23% is held by current and former employees of the Azets group. Within the funds operated by Hg Capital there is no one investor with a controlling interest. Further detail on the nature of the investors in these funds is available here.
Being part of the Azets group has allowed us to continue our development, keeping pace with our clients’ rapidly changing requirements, whilst maintaining our culture of supporting and developing our people, and investing in innovative technology to support the delivery of a truly excellent service.
Our Values
We want success for our people, our clients and for our business.
One of our differentiators has always been our ethos and culture, both within the firm and with our clients.
We have a nurturing culture that is caring and protecting of our people alongside an environment where they can develop and flourish. This ethos is also reflected in the way that we work with clients, taking time to understand their business and investing in the relationship to ensure that we can provide the best possible advice.
In order to help preserve this winning formula, to help pass it on to new joiners to the firm and to explain it to new clients, we have articulated our approach in the firm’s values of authentic, collaborative, dynamic and respectful.
Our Values
Collaborative
We are stronger together. We share knowledge, ask for help and empower each other to achieve more collectively
Authentic
We constantly ask ourselves what is the right thing to do for our people, our clients and our business, acting with integrity at all times
Respectful
Dynamic
We adapt quickly to change, finding smart ways to deliver the best results and remain one step ahead
Our Purpose
Our purpose is our driving force – to improve the lives of our colleagues, our client and our communities in a sustainable way.
Our purpose is reflected in our social commitment where we extend our core value of collaboration to encompass how we interact with the our clients and our colleagues, and our local communities and the planet. We genuinely care about helping to build a better future and take action to make a difference, managing our business in a responsible and sustainable way.
Our corporate social responsibility approach is based on five core key pillars:
Our people
Our diversity and inclusion programme aims to recruit the best talent from a wide range of backgrounds, making all our people feel valued and create a sense they belong.
We give every Blick Rothenberg team member a voice and encourage them to be themselves at work. We take our employee wellbeing and development very seriously and invest in helping our people thrive.
Our clients
We work tirelessly to build trusted client relationships and deliver the very best service to help our clients achieve their ambitions.
We continually measure and improve our client experience approach.
Our community
We encourage our people to volunteer in both our mentoring programmes and our reading and writing schemes, as well as supporting charities close to our office.
Our environment
We take our role in the global fight against climate change very seriously, with established initiatives to reduce our energy consumption and carbon footprint.
Our local office network helps us reduce global travel emissions.
We invest in new digital technologies and our client portal CoZone helps to automate many of our accounting practices, in turn, saving paper and energy.
Our suppliers
We commit to making all our suppliers feel they are part of our Blick Rothenberg community through ethical procurement strategies.
We treat our suppliers fairly and build great relationships with them, working together to drive the best possible value for our clients.
What makes us different
One of the true differentiators of Blick Rothenberg from our competitors has always been our culture and work ethos – both in terms of how we operate as a firm and how we interact with our clients.
We have a nurturing culture which cares for its people, and we create a working environment in which our team can develop and flourish.
This nurturing ethos, together with a commitment to transparency and a common purpose, is also reflected in the way that we work with clients.
We know that great relationships yield the best outcomes. That is why we take time to understand our clients’ needs and invest in our working relationships together, so that we can deliver a solution-oriented approach.
To preserve this winning formula and pass it on to new joiners to the firm, we have articulated the cultural values that we live and breathe each day.
Uniquely diverse
From our continental roots to the diverse and dynamic team we are today, Blick Rothenberg remains committed to creating a workplace founded on inclusion, which unlocks the talent within our workforce.
We appreciate the diversity, similarities and differences that make up our team. We value each unique perspective that individuals in our team bring and this is reflected in our ability to attract people from a range of dynamic backgrounds, helping us to provide deliver excellence of service the world over. For example, we have a number of Employee Resource Groups. We have our Women’s Network, our emBRace Network (representing the views of our Black and ethnic minority colleagues) our Rainbow Network (LGBT+) and our newest group the Disability Network.
Our Rainbow Network has been instrumental in ensuring that our people have the opportunity if they wish to share their gender pronouns after their names in their email signatures and website profiles.
You can’t always tell what someone’s gender pronouns are just by looking at them and sex does not pre-determine a person’s gender. Sometimes, people’s gender doesn’t sit comfortably with the sex they were assigned at birth. Giving everybody the opportunity to share their gender pronouns in their email signature is an important step in creating a more inclusive culture for all, as it will help us all respectfully refer to one another correctly, and is a great way of demonstrating allyship.
We believe this dynamic combination of individuals, cultures and skills is what helps us to yield the best possible outcomes for our people and our clients alike.