Law firms will benefit when their leaders have more time to think about their careers.

A Hard day’s night is a discussion (Managing Partner, May 2011) between Managing Partners and Patricia Wheatley Burt on challenges faced by leaders of law firms fits into a much deeper debate about career planning when becoming a MP. Patricia’s continuing research, dialogue and conversations with Managing Partners about their ambitions, plans, challenges and fears (professional and personal) are feeding into some practical and innovative solutions.

Managing Partners are struggling to find time when leading a firm, learning how to do it and fee-earning:

• Michael Shaw (MP, Cobbetts) started off his Managing Partner role with the idea he would balance work with running the business, but after six months realised he was not doing any of it terribly well.
• He also claims MPs careers should be better planned and that even in their 50s, MPs feel insecure about what would happen to them if they don’t get re-elected, often compounded if they don’t have enough funds in their pension provision.
• Joakim Edoff (Executive Partner, Setterwalls) stresses that the role of a MP is to coach people to help them to do what they can to contribute to the firm and to make sure they adopt the firm’s values. Managing Partners should be supported by COOs to take care of the day-to-day business.
• Jonathan Rigby (MP, Mourant Ozannes) confirms Managing Partners often struggle with the idea of leadership, trying to be involved in every level of managing the business. Letting the COO run the operations side, enables him to focus on managing the practice and give the firm the sense of direction.

MPs and Partners should definitely take more time to think about their careers. Read more...