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We have a partner at our AM Law 100 firm that is younger but from an old school background that because you know a guy at the client, you deserve 100% of the origination credit for life, regardless of involvement.
Background is: client apparently came in through him for about $5k worth of work in his practice area. Sat dormant for a year. Client called later asking if firm had expertise in another practice area (the client’s industry), a referral was made to this other practice group (not even by the originating partner) and the other practice group, over a period of years and without any involvement whatsoever by first partner, grew this into a $1.5M annual client.
First partner claims he should continue to have full origination, as he still knows the one guy at client. One guy doesn’t send any work into the firm through him, it all comes in through the leaders in the other practice group.
Firm management sided with the other practice group leaders, but first guy won’t drop it and is causing lots of infighting.
Thoughts?
Explain the 5 year. Why do you need that if by matter only? Original partner gets 5 years on everything and then by matter?
Happens everywhere. Strange you note this is a younger partner. Feels like he may be getting treated differently - he hasn’t put in the time? And why is the $5k or original work a big deal? If a partner spent $5k on business development for the client nobody would say that’s not enough spend to get credit. Set ego aside, would client have really called firm if they didn’t know about firm from the original interaction? Probably not. So that leans in favor of original partner. I’m more shocked by the audacity of the later partners to think they actually earned origination. At best, that should be a firm origination. Maybe I don’t know all the facts. Maybe we should all have a policy that says after the original matter, or after the first year or two or whatever, client origination should go to the firm and all partners benefit. I don’t know. Interested to see what others have to say. I’m sure this is common.
Sounds like you have a pretty good definition of what needs to be done. Seems like original partner dropped the ball. Is he taking the position that he had an ongoing BD relationship with the person at the client that drove the continued business for the firm? If not, totally F’d. If so, seems like he did a poor job communicating that to the firm and that it probably needs to be reviewed if this is a big deal.
He gets a split. Some % of credit. We do splits all the time. They can fight over what % is fair.
I would agree with this, and this is where we are headed. But his split, in my mind, is worth in the 20-40% range
Maybe firms operate differently, but it seems to me like this is his client. The business came in through his connection, whether he serviced it or not. I’d be pissed if I was him, might even leave the firm over it.
Maybe he can’t keep that client, but why work to make introductions to your partners in the future if they’re going to just lobby for your origination credit a few years down the line? This limits your ability to grow your book, you’re then pretty much limited to the work you can personally service.