She is understood to have taken off six weeks returning to India yesterday, having taken a vacation and considered a number of job offers made by other law firms. Sharma declined to comment.
Khaitan & Co Mumbai co-founding partner Rabindra Jhunjhunwala told Legally India: “There’s no dearth of new work for a new partner to join and take on new work. It strengthens our M&A team overall and it’s great to have her on board.
“She’s somebody who has been doing a lot of M&A and she’s known in the market, so it gives us an opportunity to go back and tell clients that we have another new partner to serve their needs.”
Sharma had joined AZB as a partner in 2005 from Kochhar & Co, having started her career in 1999 at Desai & Diwanji.
In 2008 she was seconded to AZB’s best-friend firm Clifford Chance for several months and she gained an England & Wales solicitor’s qualification in 2005.
Over the past five months AZB & Partners’ Mumbai office is understood to have suffered an unusually high number of associate departures across all levels.
Approximately 19 lawyers are understood to have left AZB’s Mumbai office over the past six months, which was raised with concern at a partners’ meeting roughly eight weeks ago.
However, it is understood that the firm has over the same period hired a total of 26 lawyers including freshers, bringing the firm’s total lawyer headcount in Mumbai up to roughly 110 again.
Comments
Will drink to your health!
You make age curious,
Time furious,
And the rest of us envious
Kian, one thing you may want to correct. VS joined AZB as a senior associate and was announced a partner while she was her in London for her secondment with AZB's best friend Clifford Chance
and congratulations to vaishali! All the best to her. she is one of the best lawyers I have worked with and no doubt we will be hearing of her work in the papers very soon!
Oh yeah - stop patronizing!
But she seems to be doing well at least on the popularity charts.
OR
You belong to a different age group who is insecure of good young talent.
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Now i quote - "Do law firms really care if partners leave ?" Ask the management of any law firm and the honest answer will always be in the affirmative and if it isn't then it should be, and not only limited to partners, but extend to any person who forms part of the institution.
I hope we soon see the end to a sensationalised discussion which has gone all askew with (irrelevant) references to twin towers, top partners at law firms, suspicion on the number and reasons for exit, sneezes, flu attacks and pneumonia.
Or say Naina Lal Kidwai leaves HSBC and Chanda Kochchar leaves ICICI .... then how much will that affect the banks ??
Large international firms with institutionalised client relathionships do not get affected so badly because of the precsie reason of them having institutionalised client relationships rather than individual relationships. i cannot say the same about a 20 partner outfit where probaly there are no more than 3-4 partners for a practice area
It appears VS is a star lawyer, going by the majority of the comments, and her credentials as reported in the article.
But, hey, guys people in leadership roles do make a huge difference, whether for institutions or the countries they lead. Lew Kuan Yew transformed Singapore from a British colonial outpost and malaria dump to an wealthy, efficient city of the 21st century. Steve Jobs when he returned to Apple, gave a new definition to the meaning of innovation - and in the process took the pants off Microsoft, and revered Japanese giants like Sony (the board who fired him will go down in history).
Law firms, more than any other business, are run by professionals - and by that we mean people. So when lawyers leave office for the day, the greatest assets of a firm are removed, albeit temporarily. Chairs, tables and computer screens do not count.
If a person who is in a strong leadership position and has successfully built up the firm from what it was earlier, decides to quit one fine day, then definitely that would leave a void and create uncertainty. Whether the replacement is good enough or the transition is smooth, or clients follow, only time will tell.
I know academics like to look for other factors, but ultimately, it is unrivalled leadership, which builds (and breaks) institutions, teams, organisations and countries.
Leaders inspire, and bring out the potential of the team, many a times creating champions out of no-hopers.
Enough said. Two cheers for MMS!!
If even half the things said in the earlier comments about the featured person are true, then it gives me hope that you needn't turn into, or behave like an obsessed nutcase to be good at your work, be respected for it, and rise to the top in good time.
Maybe Legally India could do a series of interviews with successful leaders in this world who are also perceived as good people by folks beyond their immediate coterie.