It’s unlikely that you were passed over due to insufficient legal ability. Partnership decisions are not made on technical performance alone. They are forward-looking determinations about your ability to drive the firm forward based on a range of factors that are not always made explicit. If you do not know what the firm values, lack influential sponsorship, or haven’t demonstrated an ability to increase firm revenue on a sustained basis, billing more hours alone may not be enough to change the outcome. You likely need to rethink what you are working on, not how hard you are working.
When Legal Brilliance Is Not Rewarded
Many who get passed over have the same first reaction: I’ll work harder. I’ll bill more. I’ll prove I want and deserve it. That reaction is understandable. It is also, in most cases, wrong.
Many senior associates operate on the assumption that being elevated to partner is a function of merit, narrowly defined as technical performance, and some degree of luck: if they do excellent legal work for long enough, someone will notice because the quality of their output will speak for itself.
That belief is not entirely false. Merit matters. You can’t be bad at your job and make partner at a serious firm. But being excellent at the work is the floor. It gets you into the conversation; it does not win the vote. And this is where many people get stuck. At that point, the process starts to feel out of their hands. The thought is that if it’s their time, and the decision-makers are fair, they will be selected. If not, they won’t. What is rarely made explicit is that there are specific, practical things you can do to materially increase your chances.
At Simpson Thacher, where I spent the early part of my legal career, legal excellence was the expectation. I saw many brilliant lawyers who didn’t make it, or who did but only after several additional years of labor and prayer. This is even truer now, as expectations of partners have only increased. To be elevated at an elite firm, you have to present a credible business case in addition to being a great lawyer.
Why the System Doesn’t Develop Everyone It Could
Attrition is a structural feature of large law firms. Not everyone can stay, and not everyone should. Capacity constraints, practice group economics, and simple life choices mean that even some very strong lawyers will leave along the way.
But the data suggests that the system is still less efficient than it could be, and that has direct implications for anyone trying to make partner.
According to the NALP Foundation, in 2024, 74% of associates left their firm within four years of being hired. Associate attrition generally stood at 20%.
Part of the issue is how development actually happens in practice. A 2025 BigHand report found that 37% of matter resourcing is driven by partner preference rather than associate development priorities, and that only 22% of reporting firms use a structured, data-driven approach and employ dedicated professionals to manage staffing. When staffing is not intentional, the pace of associate development varies significantly, even among otherwise strong associates. And if a firm is not systematically managing technical development, it is even less likely to systematically develop associates into future partners.
The downstream effects are significant. When a partner-track associate leaves or a lateral partner hire fails, the loss can be in the millions after accounting for recruitment, transition frictions, and sunk costs. Other costs may include the loss of client relationships, institutional knowledge, and mentoring capacity. Many firms then attempt to fill these gaps through additional lateral hiring or rehiring former associates whom they already know. According to the NALP Foundation, in 2024, over 10% of lateral hires at reporting firms were former associates of the firm.
Even firms with strong development programs cannot eliminate attrition. But such programs can increase the number of associates who are positioned to succeed and extend the time firms have to evaluate and promote them.
The implications for you are critical. You cannot assume that doing good work will ensure exposure to the right matters, the right people, or the right opportunities. Nor can you rely on the firm to systematically prepare you for partnership.
If you want to increase your chances, you need to take an active role in shaping how you are positioned within your firm.
The Process Behind the Process
The partnership track at most firms can feel opaque. Even at firms that expend substantial cost and effort to articulate selection criteria, not everything is spelled out. But that does not mean there is no structure. There are often patterns in how decisions are made.
If you want to progress, you shouldn’t treat the process like an inscrutable black box. You have to understand how you are actually being evaluated, and that requires deliberate effort on your part. This process ideally starts early in your career so that your understanding can compound over time. But if you have not approached it that way to date, the answer is simply to start now. Developing relationships and insights inside the firm can be done at any stage. What matters most is seeing this as part of your role, and not something that someone will guide you through.
But how? It starts with identifying who the real decision-makers are and developing relationships with them. They are not just the formal members of a partnership committee. They include the partners and potentially others whose views carry weight in committee discussions. In most firms, a relatively small number of people have disproportionate influence over how candidates are evaluated.
Think of developing relationships with decision-makers as part of your job. You need to figure out what they value and how they form judgments so that when you interact with them, they feel like they have gained something, even if it’s intangible. If this does not come naturally for you, having someone (a mentor, for example) to give you pointers can make a big difference here.
Mentors vs. Sponsors
Everyone tells you to “find a mentor.” That advice can be incomplete and therefore misleading. While mentors can be helpful, it’s important to understand what the role of a mentor is as opposed to that of a sponsor, as the two are fundamentally different relationships.
A mentor provides advice based on lived experience so you don’t have to reinvent the wheel. Sponsors put their reputation on the line to intercede on your behalf amongst their peers. Ideally, you will develop both types of relationships. The chart below shows some key characteristics of the two.
| Mentor | Sponsor | |
|---|---|---|
| What they do | Give tactical advice, help you think through decisions, share their experience | Put your name forward in rooms you are not in, advocate for your promotion, protect you during cuts |
| When they act | When you ask | When it matters, whether you ask or not |
| What they need from you | Openness, willingness to learn | Consistent, high-quality results, and loyalty they can stake their reputation on |
| The relationship | Can be informal, low-stakes | High-stakes for both sides, requires trust and mutual investment |
| Impact on partnership | Helps you prepare | Helps you get chosen |
Many lawyers struggle with developing these types of relationships, but it’s relatively simple. Start with finding a mentor. A good place to look is one of your alumni or social networks. You’ll be surprised at how many people are willing to help you if you ask and show that you’re putting in the work to develop yourself.
The Plan That Most Associates Never Build
I walk clients who have partnership ambitions through a systematic process. It is not complicated or groundbreaking, but it requires a level of strategic focus and diligence that associates often don’t do on their own because billable hours get in the way. The descriptions below reflect in brief the types of things I discuss with clients, along with questions to help you create your own path forward.
Month 1: Audit
The first month is about getting clarity regarding where you are and quickly beginning to create visibility with the people who matter.
Ask yourself:
- What information about the process am I lacking, and how will I get that information?
- Who actually influences partnership decisions in my group, and how strong are my relationships with each of them?
- Would I feel comfortable making the case for my promotion today? If not, what gives me pause?
- What are two or three simple things I know I should be doing to make my candidacy stronger but that I’ve been putting off?
- Who is, or can act as, a mentor?
Months 2–3: Plan and Test
This phase is about taking what you learned in month 1 and forming a deliberate strategy. You identify where to focus and test out strategies to see what actually works in your environment.
Ask yourself:
- How will I use the information I gained in month 1 to give myself an edge?
- How can I be recognized as highly knowledgeable in my practice area, both inside and outside of the firm?
- What resources do I need to improve my profile, and how can I get them?
- Who are the one or two people I will try to convert into sponsors?
Months 4–9: Execute and Refine
Now that you have a sense of what works, the next aim is consistency. The focus is on being seen as a valuable and trusted contributor to the firm and responding to feedback to enhance your impact.
Ask yourself:
- Am I now consistently working with the right people and in a way that allows them to see my judgment and my character, and not just my output?
- How am I demonstrating my ability to grow key client relationships and the development of the practice?
- What initiatives will I take to demonstrate my leadership potential within the firm?
- How will I ensure I’m getting feedback that allows me to improve over time?
Months 10–18: Position and Operate
By this stage, the shift is from preparation to demonstration. You are no longer trying to look like a strong associate. Your goal is to operate like a junior partner.
Ask yourself:
- How can I start behaving more like a partner in how I lead work, build relationships, and contribute to the firm?
- Is there someone who is clearly prepared to advocate for me, and have I made it easy for them to do so?
If you do these types of things, you will materially improve your chances of making partner. And even if you don’t make it at your current firm, you will still have placed yourself in a very strong position. If you are someone who is performing at a high level, known and trusted within your firm, building a visible presence in the market, managing work and people effectively, and developing a credible track record of supporting the growth of the business, you become significantly more attractive elsewhere. At that point, you are not leaving as an associate who was passed over. You are moving as a lawyer with a demonstrated trajectory, someone other firms would be happy to welcome as a valuable addition to their platform.
From Asia, the Game Is Structurally Different
For lawyers sitting in a Tokyo, Hong Kong, or Singapore office trying to make partner at a firm headquartered in New York or London, every element of this challenge is amplified.
The core problem is simple: you can be forgotten. When you are multiple time zones away from the people making partnership decisions, physical absence can create a visibility deficit that excellent work alone cannot easily overcome. You need to remind people you exist and that you provide exceptional value. That is not optional. It is the cost of working from an Asia office in a globally governed firm.
This creates several structural disadvantages that domestic associates do not face:
- Your work product lands in inboxes during off-hours. Partners in headquarters may never see you present, argue, or problem-solve in real time.
- The informal hallway conversations where reputations are built and candidacies are discussed happen without you.
- Social capital accumulates more slowly when you cannot join the after-hours dinner, the weekend event, or the casual Tuesday check-in.
These are not individual failings. They are structural consequences of a global firm model, which benefits from having talent in Asia but has not created the infrastructure needed to develop and promote that talent as well as in Europe and the Americas.
But the counterpoint is that Asia can also be an accelerator. If you have someone who is very much trusted in your region and they speak on your behalf, that can push you ahead faster than the standard track. In a smaller office, you are not competing against ten or more other seventh-years vying for one spot. You are often one of a handful. The visibility problem is real, but less competition can make the process significantly easier in some ways.
Your strategy should look something like this:
- Get sponsorship in your region from people with genuine clout in New York or London;
- Figure out who the people are in other regions who will decide your future;
- Fly to the headquarters and work out of key offices for a week or two;
- Get staffed on matters with rainmaker partners; and
- Do great work.
Making partner in Asia will require a different approach than in the US or London, but it’s not impossible.
If You Have Been Passed Over (or Think You Might Be)
Check two things.
First, are you able to handle complex matters largely independently and have you developed strong relationships with clients such that they contact you first when they have a new matter? In other words, are you close to best-in-class for someone of your class year?
If the honest answer is no, that is the simpler problem to solve: get better at your craft by taking on more demanding matters and taking more ownership of them.
Second, are you developing as a business owner, rather than merely as a lawyer? Because that is ultimately what partnership is. Examples of required competencies include the following:
- Nurturing key firm relationships
- Introducing potential new clients to the firm
- Understanding the financial mechanics of the firm
- Leading and rolling up your sleeves to help develop more junior associates
- Navigating internal firm dynamics and processes
- Not shying away from difficult conversations
- Demonstrating executive presence
- Contributing to recruiting and long-term growth
You do not need to master all of these at once. But you should be actively developing across at least several of them.
Most people who are passed over are strong on the first dimension and underinvested in the second. If that is your situation, the fix requires redirecting some of your time and attention toward the strategic work.
If, however, you are both performing well as a lawyer and a business owner and you are still passed over, it may be that the platform is not structured to support the value you can create. That is not a failure. It’s data that should inform your next move, not your sense of self-worth.
Making partner isn’t easy, but it’s certainly doable if you put in the right kind of work over a protracted period. If you could use help navigating the process, you don’t have to figure it out alone.