Out of India’s six largest corporate law firms, Trilegal has the shortest partnership track while on average it takes longest at J Sagar Associates (JSA), where the path is on average two years longer, reveals research conducted by Legally India of more than 100 partners promoted between 2009 and 2013.
Legally India analysed the reported partnership promotions since 2009 across India’s six largest law firms – Amarchand Mangaldas, AZB & Partners, JSA, Khaitan & Co, Luthra & Luthra and Trilegal – revealing that on average it took 9.1 years* since graduating from university for lawyers to be called into the partnership.
Trilegal
Trilegal had promoted nine lawyers into its non-equity partnership since 2009. On average, a Trilegal partner had graduated eight years ago, with the youngest taking only 7.7 years and the most senior getting the nod after 9 years (the data excludes those promoted into the equity lockstep from salaried partnership, which was abolished in 2012 with a conversion into a full equity lockstep partnership).
Trilegal also had the narrowest range of seniorities among its promoted partners, with a standard deviation** of only 0.5 years in its sample*** set.
Amarchand & Luthra: Peas in a pod
At Amarchand and Luthra’s corporate and tax divisions, it has taken on average 9.1 years to be called on to become a non-equity partner, although it has recently taken as few as 6.7 years in the case of Amarchand, or 7.4 years in Luthra’s case. Both are almost identical at the top end too, with the most senior promotions at both firms happening around the 14-year mark.
However, Luthra’s litigation division, which is a separate partnership that welcomed three new salaried partners since 2009 according to Legally India reports, had a wait time of between 16 and 20 years from graduation to partnership.
Two tales of two cities
At Amarchand, 20 were promoted in Delhi and 15 in Mumbai, with the average seniority running to 8.8 and 8.5 years respectively. In Amarchand’s Bangalore office, where three partners were promoted in our sample*** during the period, it took 10.2 years on average to ascend into the non-equity layer.
Luthra was considerably more Delhi-heavy in its promotions, with the capital seeing 13 promotions compared to only four in Mumbai and one in Bangalore. The average seniority in Delhi was 9.5 years, but in Mumbai it only took 8.1 years, on average, to make it into the partnership.
AZB, Khaitan
At AZB and Khaitan those bumped into the non-equity partnership since 2009 have had to wait just over nine years to become partner.
At both firms, there majority are clustered quite closely to the statistical average, with non-equity partners at AZB ranging from 6.9 to 11.7 years of life post graduation, while at Khaitan the band is even narrower from 7.7 to 10.8 years.
Khaitan ended its all-equity partnership model in September 2010, introducing the retained partner designation. However, surprisingly the seniority of equity and non-equity partners have been almost identical so far at 9.4 and 9.3 years respectively.
J Sagar Associates
At JSA, the non-equity partner track is typically 9.7 years long – which is more than at the five other corporate firm entities – and to become equity partner, on average, took 13.2 years.
However, JSA also boasted the greatest spread in seniority out of all firms, with both equity and non-equity samples having a larger standard deviation** than the other firms.
JSA, for instance, boasted the most junior non-equity partner out of all firms, at only 5.7 years of post-graduation experience. JSA operates a partnership selection and appraisal process that includes giving a strong weight to a number of parameters apart from just billings.
Clarification: For the avoidance of doubt, this study does not give any direct insight into how many associates never make it to partner level or leave firms before that point in seniority that they could become eligible for partner.
Views outside
At US firms it takes on average 10.5 years to be called into a law firm partnership, according to a study by the American Lawyer in 2012.
At the top 10 UK law firms, it takes 10.6 years to become partner, according to research by UK legal magazine Legal Week, while at the largest four magic circle law firms the average partner track is nine years long, and Herbert Smith Freehills’ partnership had only 7.25 years under its belt in 2013. However, at Eversheds and Norton Rose the path to partnership was just under 14 years.
Photo by Casey Fleser
| Law firm sample | Avg seniority (years) at promotion* | Variation (standard deviations**) | Minimum seniority (years) | Maximum seniority (years) | Total partners in sample*** |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Trilegal | 8 | 0.5 | 7.7 | 9 | 9 |
| Amarchand Mangaldas | 9.1 | 1.8 | 6.7 | 14.2 | 40 |
| Luthra & Luthra (corporate / tax) | 9.1 | 2.1 | 7.4 | 14.3 | 19 |
| AZB & Partners | 9.2 | 1.4 | 6.9 | 11.7 | 11 |
| Khaitan & Co (equity) | 9.4 | 1.6 | 6.7 | 11.7 | 10 |
| Khaitan & Co (non-equity) | 9.3 | 1.2 | 7.7 | 10.8 | 7 |
| — Khaitan & Co (all) | 9.3 | 6.7 | 11.7 | 17 | |
| JSA (equity) | 13.2 | 2.9 | 9.7 | 16.7 | 4 |
| JSA (non-equity) | 9.7 | 2.3 | 5.7 | 14.7 | 31 |
| — JSA (all) | 10.1 | 5.7 | 16.7 | 35 | |
| Luthra & Luthra (litigation) | 18 | 2 | 16 | 20 | 3 |
| TOTAL (excl equity / Luthra lit) | 9.2 | 1.9 | 5.7 | 16.7 | 117 |
* Year count calculated between August of year of graduation to the month of the date of promotion. Year count does not directly equate to PQE (post-qualification experience), as it does not count time spent pursuing further education or career breaks. ** Standard deviations (SD) measure how close to the average most of the sample is. I.e., if the SD number is low, it means that most partners seniority was very close to the average, if it’s high, it means that there is typically a large variation from the average. *** Samples excludes a small number of partners for whom the graduation year could not be confirmed, or statistical outliers, or those who had been in other careers before entering the law.
Source: Legally India archive stories and research between 2009 and 2013
Additional research and reporting by Prachi Shrivastava & Abhyuday Bhotika
Comments
just one thing. Not all associates with these many years of experience make it to partnership. What happens to them? Are they coerced to exit? Or are they retained at such lower poaitions?
However, it should be possible to extrapolate somewhat.
If for argument's sake, a firm hires 30 freshers every year and only makes 10 partners every year, then yes, some of those freshers clearly disappear (not accounting for lateral partner hires).
Every law firm is built like a pyramid - there are fewer partners on top than associates on the bottom (aka leverage -- number of partners < managing associates < senior associates < associates < freshers).
The higher the leverage, the more associates clearly leave a firm before they become partner or stay without ever making partner. As such, *not* making partners is as much of the business model of all law firms as making partners, and often those who haven't been made partners when their peers have been, take that as a sign (or are expressly or implicitly told by management it's a sign) that they should leave.
This is very rough back-of-napkin stuff, but maybe someone can actually put some better figures and theory to this than I have - how big is the pool of associates eligible for partner and how many are generally made at the big firms?
Also, are they all actually ready for partnership? Or is it just that firms want to charge clients at partner rack rates and hence promotes principal/ managing associates to partner??
Further, Kian is right about the pyramid. A number of people who join a firm no longer remain in contention for partnership for a variety of reasons. These could include:
- leaving the profession. More people who enter the profession leave and do something else. Partly perhaps to do with how hard they have to work and partly because it is very hard to know what you want to do at 17-18 and the sensible ones leave once they realise that the choice was not for them.
- going in-house for a different pace of life or set of challenges.
- the pace of market expansion. People should remember that we are coming off a 3-4 year period of slow growth. It is entirely possible that some people who might otherwise have become partner in the larger firms in a boom economy have not or are taking longer to do because there isn't a business case to make another partner. Of course, there are enough people in some of these firms who are called partner but function under the close supervision of senior partners. Any firm that does not have salaried partners will have to select their partners very carefully in the current economy.
- not being good enough. The external perception of a senior lawyer and their suitability for partnership can be quite different from that of the firm itself. Being flashy and flamboyant often gets mistaken for being good.
- Fit. A good service provider might however be a terrible boss, disruptive to the team they work in, not fit in with the other partners etc.
In any good firm, partnership should not be an entitlement, it needs to be earned and on top of that, the firm has to need that person as a partner. These are businesses that people are running, not clubs or charities!
Anyway, that's my two bits!
Anyways, seems like you are not enjoying your vacation if you are reading comments on LI and responding:-)
true.. the road to partnership in Trilegal seems very hazy.. some made partners (a very lucky lot!)a few years ago when 2-3 good partners left to form Phoenix ..then 2003 batch was promoted to salaried partnership at somewhat 8 years PQE ..thereafter, the model changed to all equity.. and everyone became equity partners ..(again a very lucky lot)..with this salaried partner position got abolished and the next two batches 2004 and 05 didn't get time to understand what was happening..i think all the people from 2005 (whose chance would have come next year) have already left the firm while there was still time...the unluckiest lot of 2004 batch is still in a limbo (with one exception who made partner this year)... i hear that most of the 2006 and 2007 batches have already started looking for a job... though I understand the reasons for abolishing salaried partner positions, do not think it will be sustainable in current law firm scenario...
Do also a research the quality other that knowing LAW that are required to be a Partner . This will be really interesting and introspecting >
At CB, last promotion of Partnership (both EP and SP) happened in year 2000 and before than that in year 1973...
Comment meant in jest. Don't take it too seriously :)
VR Neelakantan
Amita Choudhary
Ipsita Dutta
Aysswarya Murthy
Gaurav Gupte
Vandana Pai Bharucha
Most of them were promoted in 2012...