I’ll be put up for partner next year, and I am struggling with how to balance my increasing need and desire to do BD with the need (and desire) to focus on client billable work. I’m sure this is a problem for everyone their whole career, but if any partners could provide some advice on how to manage this really pivotal time, I’d appreciate it. My firm and market are such that there’s a need for me to do both - we have to hustle for clients, and I can’t fully turn over deals to my juniors.

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You can’t build and bill. Let me say that for those in the back, you cannot build and bill. There’s only so much time in a day, but the trick is to find the efficient way to build while still billing. This is a post pandemic world so your BD efforts need to reflect that reality. This past year I landed like 5 new clients from the comfort of my home. No lunches, no dinners, no free offers for CLEs, just straight AIM game like it was 1998. Don’t get me wrong, all those things work and you have to do you. I will say that my billables have decreased YoY, but my book has increased YoY as well as my comp. So, I bill, but I build. I would rather bring in 6,000 hours that I don’t do and bill 1,800 then bill 2,500 and bring in no additional hours.

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P1, thanks for this. Hugely helpful. It’s a bit of a mindbender to step back from billing but I need to get used to it to put my focus where it needs to be for the next decade of my career. Would love to hear what’s been successful for you in terms of not in person BD. I feel like all my partners are getting it done through massive amounts of face time.

I recently made partner and my advice is to spend more time on BD than you think you should. It pays off and, ultimately, it is the only thing your firm will care about in the long run amd the only thing you get to take with you if you leave your firm.

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Thanks A1. This absolutely makes sense - I just need to get used to it and figure out how to reduce billing without reducing quality for the clients I do have.

Also following, also slightly different situation in that I’m at a well-established major firm in NYC. I keep getting told “no one is expecting you to bring in clients, just do good work and that is the first and best source of BD.” But on the other hand, it seems like partners are grinding on BD all the time.

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Same situation - following!

I just made partner and I did no BD this past year but did run some high profile deals that gave me a lot of visibility in the firm.

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