PROFESSOR Lorne Crerar feels like a very lucky man. As chairman of Harper Macleod, the £25.7 million turnover law firm that he co-founded nearly three decades ago, he gets to do what he describes as his “dream job” on a daily basis. But, as he also holds the chairmanship of economic development agency Highlands & Islands Enterprise (HIE), he gets to do his “second dream job” too.

“HIE was created 50 years ago as Highlands & Islands Development Board because of the ‘Highlands problem’, which was manifested by significant migration out of the region because of lack of opportunities outside forestry, fishing and crofting,” Mr Crerar said.

“It was set up to create that opportunity and has been hugely successful. The stats in terms of population growth, age demographic and employment are all positive. The Highlands and Islands has enormous opportunity in the modern, digital economy to do even better.

“Digital connectivity will enable our digital businesses to do more and it’s a wonderful place to live and work.”

So strong is Mr Crerar’s belief in the regional economy that he recently persuaded the Scottish Government to abandon plans to merge the boards of HIE and Scottish Enterprise, allowing them instead to continue as distinct entities. Although that means that Mr Crerar ultimately protected his own job as chair of the agency, he said he was asked to look at the matter because he “had the credentials but I also had the experience of running a public sector agency and felt very strongly that keeping the board was the right answer”.

The main reason is Mr Crerar’s belief that an economic development agency should have “intimate knowledge of the region” it serves, with separate agencies that collaborate together being preferable to an overarching super-agency.

“My review describes in detail how that collaboration will be monitored and marshalled for the greater good of the Scottish economy,” he said. “The chairs of each agency will ensure that the agencies collaborate to deliver a better return for the buck.”

The HIE job is just one of the extra-curricular roles that Mr Crerar fulfils. Having studied law at the University of Glasgow he remained at the institution teaching banking law until last year and, in addition to carrying out a review that revolutionised the way residential property Home Reports are prepared in Scotland, has also served as a judicial officer at numerous rugby tournaments.

He encourages Harper Macleod’s lawyers to do the same because “it’s an important part of being a lawyer” to “understand the economy and business better”.

Business, and entrepreneurialism in particular, is something that Mr Crerar understands well, having given up partnership at established firm Ross Harper & Murphy to set up Harper Macleod alongside Rod McKenzie in 1988.

“At the start I remember a very senior banker saying to me that setting up a commercial law firm from scratch with aspirations of having a growing business was unachievable,” he said. “When I look back on the start I think what was I thinking, giving up partnership, my sportscar and all that went with it but it’s been a fantastic journey and I’ve never had a sleepless night where I’ve regretted it.”

This is in part because the words of that senior banker have continued to ring in Mr Crerar’s ears and, far from dissuading him, have encouraged him to make unorthodox moves that have been of benefit to the firm.

Admitting that the best way to motivate him is to tell him something cannot be done, Mr Crerar said that his partners thought he had “lost the plot” when, in 2015, he took the firm to Shetland via the acquisition of local firm Dowle Smith & Rutherford.

That and a similar move into Inverness have, he said, been a success for the firm, which will continue to look at other ways of expanding its footprint in what is a shrinking marketplace.

Describing himself as “a very devoted Scot” he said any physical expansion would take place within the country’s borders, although he noted that boots on the ground would not necessarily be a prerequisite of further growth.

“Do I think there’s more room to grow in the Scottish pond? Yes,” Mr Crerar said. “We wouldn’t open outside Scotland because of the dilution of talent - we want to be a bigger, more sustainable, broader reach-business in Scotland.

“We might do something around being able to penetrate markets without actually being there. The issue with looking to the future is how we will communicate with clients and how millennials would want to communicate with their lawyer. I would want to meet mine, others might not.”

Ultimately, though, how the firm develops in the future is unlikely to be Mr Crerar’s concern. Although at age 62 he has no plans to retire from the firm yet, he said that when he does he will not look to manage it from afar.

“It’s been my baby, it’s been an adolescent, it’s been to university and now it’s an adult, and adults need their own opportunities,” he explained.