How to avoid working with a partner Forum

[Anonymous User]

Anon for obvious reasons. I am a first year at v20 and I am wondering if there is any polite way to turn down work from a particular partner who I really do not want to work with for various reasons without hurting my reputation. I’ve never turned down any work so far, but I just really do not want to work with this person or the practice area he/she is in. Any advice would be appreciated.

[Anonymous User]

Biglaw partner. This question is very hard to answer in the abstract without knowing your firm's staffing system, how powerful this particular partner is, how vindictive he/she is, what your other work streams look like, etc. In general, however, the key is to make yourself sufficiently busy working for someone else that you can credibly claim that you don't have time to work on this person's matters. I also think that "I don't want to do work in X practice area because I am trying to build a practice in Y area" starts becoming a pretty good excuse down the road, as it makes it less about not wanting to work with a particular person and more about the nature of the work. That said, you are probably too junior to use it yet; it becomes much more valuable once you get a few years in, particularly if you can credibly claim that you have some sort of specialized practice.

[Anonymous User]

Biglaw partner. This question is very hard to answer in the abstract without knowing your firm's staffing system, how powerful this particular partner is, how vindictive he/she is, what your other work streams look like, etc. In general, however, the key is to make yourself sufficiently busy working for someone else that you can credibly claim that you don't have time to work on this person's matters. I also think that "I don't want to do work in X practice area because I am trying to build a practice in Y area" starts becoming a pretty good excuse down the road, as it makes it less about not wanting to work with a particular person and more about the nature of the work. That said, you are probably too junior to use it yet; it becomes much more valuable once you get a few years in, particularly if you can credibly claim that you have some sort of specialized practice.

Thanks for the response. From your perspective how busy is sufficiently busy? 60 hours a week?

[Anonymous User]

Biglaw partner. 60 is certainly sufficient, but (at least at my firm) you could probably get away with less (50ish week in week out).

[Anonymous User]

Agree with the advise about being consistently "Busy" - busy does not need to mean overwhelmed or hitting a particular hours threshold, but you should have at least a couple active matters that you can point to at any time as limiting your bandwidth, ideally where the partners on those matters would confirm if asked that you are staffed and actively engaged on them. If you have a slower week, but you can credibly claim that work on an active matter could pick up at any moment, that can often be enough.

This is a difficult issue though and I empathize. I am more senior now, but still struggle sometimes with navigating difficult partners. I've come to terms with the fact that not everyone will think equally highly of me at the firm, and that's OK - I'm not trying to make partner myself, my hours are fine, and there are enough people who truly value my work that I know I'm never going to get such a bad review that I'm shown the door.

[Anonymous User]

Agree with the advise about being consistently "Busy" - busy does not need to mean overwhelmed or hitting a particular hours threshold, but you should have at least a couple active matters that you can point to at any time as limiting your bandwidth, ideally where the partners on those matters would confirm if asked that you are staffed and actively engaged on them. If you have a slower week, but you can credibly claim that work on an active matter could pick up at any moment, that can often be enough.

This is a difficult issue though and I empathize. I am more senior now, but still struggle sometimes with navigating difficult partners. I've come to terms with the fact that not everyone will think equally highly of me at the firm, and that's OK - I'm not trying to make partner myself, my hours are fine, and there are enough people who truly value my work that I know I'm never going to get such a bad review that I'm shown the door.

Would one bad review from a partner in a practice area I am not interested in hurt me? as in getting fired?

[Anonymous User]

Anon because I can relate. I have good reviews at my V10 year after year, but there is one partner where I always consider quitting the firm because of how bad it gets working for him.

I suspect that our staffing person can tell that I am trying to avoid him even though I always try to make it sound like a capacity issue because I turned down work from him at least three times now. So far it has been successful.

[Anonymous User]

Would one bad review from a partner in a practice area I am not interested in hurt me? as in getting fired?

No one gets fired over one bad review.

How delicately you approach this situation depends on what kind of partner you're dealing with. I've dealt with plenty of new lateral partners and junior non-equity partners who have tried to impose all sorts of ridiculous demands but were ultimately powerless when I refused to work for them. Rainmakers, on the other hand, shouldn't be crossed...

[12YrsAnAssociate]

I'm way more senior than you (hence my username), and I'm not sure this would work for a junior associate, but I just say I'm busy even when I'm not. No one has ever challenged it by raising my hours (even in stretches when my hours are super low), but if they did, I'd probably point to things outside of work or assignments I've already committed to that don't yet show in my hours.

I think one thing that made my life much easier is learning who to say no to and not giving in. Some people suck to work for. Some people give very critical reviews. Some people do boring ass work that I don't want to end up doing in my career. I avoid all those people because there are plenty of people that are good to work for and have good work in areas I'm interested in and I'd rather spend my time working for them.

[Anonymous User]

I'm way more senior than you (hence my username), and I'm not sure this would work for a junior associate, but I just say I'm busy even when I'm not. No one has ever challenged it by raising my hours (even in stretches when my hours are super low), but if they did, I'd probably point to things outside of work or assignments I've already committed to that don't yet show in my hours.

I do this as a midlevel as well. I've turned down work by saying I'm busy as a pretext when I've had back to back 100 hour months. It blows over as long as you then do good work and hit your hours eventually. And I think it helps to have a good reputation, so this could be trickier as a junior. But keep this in mind.

[Anonymous User]

Agree with the advise about being consistently "Busy" - busy does not need to mean overwhelmed or hitting a particular hours threshold, but you should have at least a couple active matters that you can point to at any time as limiting your bandwidth, ideally where the partners on those matters would confirm if asked that you are staffed and actively engaged on them. If you have a slower week, but you can credibly claim that work on an active matter could pick up at any moment, that can often be enough.

This is a difficult issue though and I empathize. I am more senior now, but still struggle sometimes with navigating difficult partners. I've come to terms with the fact that not everyone will think equally highly of me at the firm, and that's OK - I'm not trying to make partner myself, my hours are fine, and there are enough people who truly value my work that I know I'm never going to get such a bad review that I'm shown the door.

Would one bad review from a partner in a practice area I am not interested in hurt me? as in getting fired?

No way. I had a partner who I hated working for and who had almost no power/was generally known to be terrible. I knew as a mid-level that I had a pretty good rep, so I basically did completely garbage work for this partner and blew deadlines. They never staffed me again. I know they’ve shit talked me to the other partners, because one called and asked if everything was ok and made reference to the comments. It all blew over and I didn’t solicit that person’s feedback in my review. I’m still around to tell the tale.

That said, if this was a rainmaker, would have handled way differently.

[Anonymous User]

I just don’t think this partner is a rainmaker, but how do I know for sure?

[BrowsingTLS]

I just don’t think this partner is a rainmaker, but how do I know for sure?

Tell the partner you'll let them see your book of business if they let you see theirs. If their book is less than $1 billion, they're not a rainmaker and they are never gonna be a rainmaker.

Or view their firm bio/internal only firm info about which cases they're on, their seniority compared to other partners on the same cases, and compare to information for known rainmakers to get a general sense. If you don't know a single rainmaker, you, too, are never gonna make it.

Cheers.

[LittleRedCorvette]

Disagreeing a little on the "handle differently if a rainmaker" line. I think it doesn't matter, and realistically -- are you (or the "rainmaker") going to be here in 10 years when you're up for non-equity partner? And if so, do you think the RM is going to remember the 1st year who turned them down? No. Just say "I appreciate you considering me for this transaction. Unfortunately I am working on [deals] and won't be able to help here. I apologize for the inconvenience."

[Anonymous User]

[Annon because the below could possibly ID me if anyone knows / works with me]

Lots of the advice in this thread overthinks the issue IMO. If you dont want to do a deal / work with someone, say no. Full stop. Note, this wont always mean you will not have to do the deal, but say no, and as long as you have hours/work elsewhere, no one will care that much long term in my experience.

I say no (almost) every time to three different partners for the below reasons:

Partner 1: Their deals are always a mess. They are an awful manager who never pushes back on client asks, no matter how unreasonable or useless. This partner likes to schedule calls at 8-12 PM, regardless of day of the week or stated availability. This partner have 0 actual power within the firm.

Partner 2: I like this Partner personally but their clients are (in my experience) always absurd and unreasonable (aka - the worst). Their deals are convoluted and super complicated because of the financing / LLC structure of our client and I don't want to deal with that.

Partner 3: This partner only cares about running up as big a bill as possible. Note: This partner is a "kinda big deal" and brings in a lot of business. I will do their deals if (a) there is another partner I like / trust more as a buffer, or (b) I am doing something ancillary (e.g., diligence /specialty support). I wont work for this partner directly ever again if I can avoid it.

I also told one of the rainmakers in my office 3 no three times in a 4 month span as a 2nd year several years ago (I am a 7th year now). And nothing happened. They finally stopped asking and I have been happily (ha) doing work I generally enjoy for better partners to work for for the last 5 years with no palpable negative effects. We interact at events and there has never been an implication that this partner hates me somehow due to me telling them I could not do some deals half a decade ago.

major caveat - as always - YMMV, but don't overthink it.

If you have billed 40+ hours, and reasonably expect that you will have that many hours next week, there is nothing - nothing - obligating you to take on an additional deal on 4 pm Friday, particularly when you know there will already be weekend hours in you r future. The 60 hour threshold noted below is BS IMO. If billing (not working) a full week's worth of hours is not enough, then this whole profession is more broken than I thought. You should not, as a junior associate, feel obligated to give away more of your life when you are already working well over full time. Staffing problems due to lack of associates is a hiring problem.

[Anonymous User]

In my experience partners that I've initially hated have become nicer once you start showing that you can do good work for them. It may take time though and may not be possible as a very junior associate.

These may not be popular suggestions, but doing sub-par work for certain partners can get you off their deals. You'll need to do excellent work for others though, but as long as you have a few partners in your corner that have a solid book of business, you can get away with stepping on a few toes.

If you have a central staffing coordinator you can also try telling them that you flat out refuse to work with certain people. People who work at law firms tend to be very conflict-avoidant and I have seen this work before at multiple firms with little to no repercussions.

For the majority of associates, the goal in biglaw is just survival and not partnership. My best advice is to make your time there as minimally awful as possible. If that means that not every single person at the firm likes you then so be it (you can't please everyone).

[Anonymous User]

In my experience partners that I've initially hated have become nicer once you start showing that you can do good work for them. It may take time though and may not be possible as a very junior associate.

These may not be popular suggestions, but doing sub-par work for certain partners can get you off their deals. You'll need to do excellent work for others though, but as long as you have a few partners in your corner that have a solid book of business, you can get away with stepping on a few toes.

So either do really good work or really bad work, never mediocre. Got it.

[Anonymous User]

Disagreeing a little on the "handle differently if a rainmaker" line. I think it doesn't matter, and realistically -- are you (or the "rainmaker") going to be here in 10 years when you're up for non-equity partner? And if so, do you think the RM is going to remember the 1st year who turned them down? No. Just say "I appreciate you considering me for this transaction. Unfortunately I am working on [deals] and won't be able to help here. I apologize for the inconvenience."

Also in today's market will rainmaker even be at the same firm in two years from now