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Here is my honest 2 cents. It isn’t *just* about billables, it is about power. You need to make yourself powerful enough that the firm is afraid to lose you. Some of the best advice I’ve never heard is that “a firm only makes you partner when they have to”. If you get your own clients, and establish relationships with existing clients, the firm will be afraid you will walk and take the business with you. That’s the easiest way to get the promotion - forcing their hand.
Correct
Rising Star
Promoted to partner? No, don’t wait for a tap. Schedule meetings/lunches with a few key people in your group/at the firm, tell them you want to go for partner within the next few years, and ask what you need to do to get there (billables, bus dev, profile, other contributions, etc).
They have to like you AND you have to make them money. Them liking you is very important.
Be likable.
Ask. Take decision makers to lunch or coffee. Ask where you’re at in the trajectory and express that you want to be promoted. Bigger firms will have specific guidelines or criteria that make you eligible for promotion. Smaller ones it may not be written down but decision makers will know.
I seriously don't understand some of these posts. Like, didn't your parents teach you anything about how to networking and politics and how important sales is to almost any career?
P3 not all parents have those skills. My father had his own accounting firm and I learn many skills from seeing him interact with his clients, colleagues, authorities, at an early age.
I have friends who didn’t have the same background, sometimes being the first lawyers in their family or even the first to attend university. They would obviously not have that acumen or exposure to that world.
There is no criteria because then they’d have to come up with some other excuse when you meet the criteria.
Be a “good firm citizen,” which means whatever we want it to mean depending on the circumstances.
Depends on the nature of the practice group, but generally speaking, you need to demonstrate that you can bring “new” money into the partnership, not just service existing clients or clients that your partners bring in. Again, depends on the nature of your practice, but if you’re seen as a cost-center, no reputable partnership is going to welcome you into their ranks. If you want a piece of the pie, you typically have to grow it.
What year are you? What’s the average years of experience for a first year partner at your firm?
Any friends can assist me i appreciate