Will the client stay when the partner retires?

Some law firms needlessly lose a significant amount of business when senior partners retire. Yet anticipating and preparing for those retirements with an effective client succession process can ensure that handovers go smoothly and clients stay with the firm when the relationship partner retires. This protects the firm’s finances and stability and has numerous other benefits as well.

Highlights of this issue:
• How partner retirements can lead to lucrative business opportunities for a law firm.
• Retirement resources that may be helpful.
• New publications that may interest you.
• My upcoming speaking engagements. If you’ll be in any of the cities where I’ll be, let me know if you’d like to get together.

Retirement and Client Succession
Partner retirements present valuable opportunities that too many law firms overlook. In firms of all sizes, senior partners often represent a large percentage – sometimes the majority – of the partners who control major client relationships and generate a disproportionate percentage of firm revenues. This means that their retirement can have a terrible, even catastrophic, financial impact on the firm if their clients decide to take their business elsewhere. After all, clients frequently use an outside lawyer’s retirement as a chance to look around for new representation, and in this competitive climate, there are many firms for them to choose from.

On the other hand, a partner’s pending retirement can give your firm numerous lucrative opportunities. If managed properly, transitioning clients to other lawyers in your firm can increase revenues and firm stability by

• Retaining and strengthening the retiring partner’s client relationships,
• Expanding those client relationships,
• Building on the retiring partner’s contacts and community leadership roles, and
• Retaining junior partners and attracting talented laterals.

When other lawyers in the firm have well-established relationships with the client and are already assuming responsibility for some of the client’s work, the senior partner’s departure may be poignant but the handoff is seamless and the firm’s representation continues smoothly. Plus, during the lead-up to that departure, conversations about the client’s current and future legal needs can result in new and additional ways the firm can serve the client.

Effective client transitions can also help the firm retain younger partners who see that upward mobility and future career success are real possibilities for them. From a recruiting standpoint, they increase the firm’s appeal to top quality laterals looking for a firm where they can move up and ahead in their careers. And because they lead to stable relationships and happy clients, effective transitions can strengthen the firm’s reputation among clients, the business world, and the legal community.

The challenge, though, is how to manage client transitions properly. The firm, the retiring lawyer, the client and the successor lawyers all have their own interests and needs that must be addressed, and where they conflict, resolved. Retiring partners all have unique situations that must be dealt with individually, and the transition processes and incentives may need to be customized. Incentives may also be necessary for successor partners, who may prefer to give priority to their own clients or to generating their own business.

If your firm wants to retain valuable clients and talented junior partners, then a systematic but flexible and supportive process for transitioning clients is essential. If you would like to talk with me about how your firm can design such a system, please get in touch with me.

Retirement resources for individuals and firms

• Retirement by Design: A Guided Workbook for Creating a Happy and Purposeful Future
• Got a Minute? A series of free, brief videos about various retirement issues specific to lawyers and law firms
• E-Course: Retirement by Design (companion to the book)
• Articles, podcasts, and webinars

New Publications
Sharon Meit Abrahams, “Start 2024 By Considering the Synergy Between Retirement and Succession, Planning,” Law.com, January 05, 2024, in which I’m quoted extensively.

“The Gift and Challenge of Longevity: Preparing for Long Careers Marked by Changes, ” is the chapter I contributed to Her Story: The Resilient Woman Lawyer’s Guide to Conquering Obstacles, a new book published by the ABA Litigation Section’s Woman Advocate Committee.

Upcoming programs
Gladstone CMO Roundtable in San Francisco, March 6, 2024, San Francisco. I’ll speak about “Retirement and Succession: Resolving Challenges, Maximizing Opportunities.”

New York City Bar Association, April 16. I’ll present a webinar on “Retirement by Design: Creating a Happy and Purposeful Future.”

NALP 2024 Annual Education Conference, April 19, Boston. I’ll join others on a panel discussing “Retired Partners: Easing the Retirement Process and Engagement in Alumni Programs.”

Looking for guidance or assistance?
If you or your firm would like to discuss how I might be able to help you address retirement and succession issues, or if you’re looking for a speaker on this subject, please get in touch with me.