The biggest reason seems to be tied to sharing.
The post Why Do So Few Law Firms Still Have An 8-Year Partnership Track? appeared first on Above the Law.
Recently, I was cleaning out some of my old things, and I stumbled upon the offer letter I received for the first Biglaw job I had at the beginning of my career. The five-page offer letter included a lot of the expected legalese, such as my salary information, how bonuses would be calculated, and other matters. The offer letter also said that I would be considered for partnership eight years after starting work as an associate. As it turns out, I only worked at that shop for a little over a year, but reading that language reminded that most law firms used to stick to an eight-year partnership track. From discussions with my friends and colleagues, very few firms outside the elite shops still stick to an eight-year partnership track, and there are likely various reasons for this.
Perhaps the biggest reason is because partners these days seem less willing to share ownership of a law firm with other lawyers. In the past decade, positions not on the partnership track have flourished as law firms attempt to hire new attorneys without fear that these lawyers will one day share a piece of the ownership pie. In recent years, there has also been an explosion of two-tracked partnership systems at law firms as some partners are equity partners of a shop with an ownership stake and others are simply contract partners who pull a salary. Awarding partnership after longer periods of employment at a shop means that a firm does not have to give away its crown jewels to lawyers anytime soon and that attorneys really need to work hard to earn partnership.
Another reason why so few law firms seem to still stick to an eight-year partnership track is because numerous law firms have moved away from explicit and defined employment benefits. Many law firms have benefits from promising employees more fluid employment benefits so that expectations are low among those who work at a shop. For instance, I once worked at a law firm that did not have a defined vacation policy. The firm reasoned that everyone could take as much time as they wanted off from work so long as they completed all of their assignments.
At first, this seemed like a windfall, since employees could theoretically take off more time than at other shops. However, in practice, this meant that workers took far less time off from work since vacation benefits were not defined. This also meant that the firm did not need to pay workers for unused vacation time when workers left the firm since no employee had a defined amount of time they could take off for vacation each year.
This same law firm did not have a defined partnership track. Law firm management said that this was a benefit to workers, and that theoretically, associates could be elevated to partnership after say five years instead of the eight years that was standard at many shops. However, in practice, the lack of a defined partnership track meant that far fewer people were elevated to partner. Sometimes, the law firm would elevate more senior people to “of counsel” or similar positions, but in many instances, there were attorneys working at the law firm for a decade or longer who were in their 40s and were still being called associates. The lack of a defined partnership track made it easier for the law firm to deprive associates of a promotion since there were no expectations about when it was reasonable for someone to be promoted to partner.
Although some top firms still have an eight-year partnership track, many have moved to undefined and fluid time horizons for making partnership determinations. Such practices undoubtedly benefit management of law firms since it helps deprive attorneys of promotions and makes it more difficult for associates to bargain for better job opportunities.
Jordan Rothman is a partner of The Rothman Law Firm, a full-service New York and New Jersey law firm. He is also the founder of Student Debt Diaries, a website discussing how he paid off his student loans. You can reach Jordan through email at jordan@rothman.law.
