What advice would you give to someone who feels they were discriminated against as part of the partner promotion process? Trying to remain objective to the claims merits, but give good advice on next steps.

Op, call Talent.

Discrimination is a dangerous word. I do not mess with that. It’s a shitty year for all of our promotion classes. You person very well may have a case but in my experience, it’s rarely that for partner promotion. Not to say we don’t have biases but they typically don’t culminate at the promotion normally. It’s a slow churn of undermining and lack of support and strategic opps, ie passive aggressive. It is hard to prove. Alternatively if it’s a blunt discrimination that violates code of ethics, then that should be fairly straightforward to deal with.

My talk track would be. Help me understand why you think so. Let me help you understand the process - if you’re a younger pp or direct admit and don’t understand it well yourself, have those conversations first. Understand why they feel that way, and then consult with Talent before engaging further.

Try picking up golf, learning about beers, and wearing oversized khaki pants. Should do the trick next year! Godspeed!

Bias is part of the game. By the time one reaches the up for Partner level- there shouldn’t be any surprises …

Hard to offer you advice without understanding why you feel you were discriminated against. Maybe some more context would be helpful.

They should consult with an attorney - and you need to be careful. If they think they were wronged and they think you agree, you might find yourself party to a lawsuit. If you’re not an attorney, there is little you can to help and a lot you can do to make things worse.

I don’t fully agree with the sentiment here. As a coach, you can side with the candidate. Even if there’s nothing you can do. Partnership nomination is part merit, part biases, part favoring one over another. We all have done it. However, if there’s a real issue that can be traced. I’d advise them to address it directly with ethics/talent.

Is there merit to their claim?

I think it’s extremely unlikely they were explicitly ‘discriminated’ in the process. I would seek to understand why they feel that way first.

P3 and P1 are dead right now