Mentoring, Collegiality Key to Making Partner

Check out this article in the Complete Lawyer -- Navigate the Bridges to Partnership by Paula Patton -- based upon a recent NALP study. Excerpt from that article on the importance of mentoring to career advancement below.

Associates who made partner were often mentored by the firm’s partners, with 73% of respondents reporting that they “always” or "almost always” had this relationship as associates.

The respondents who had been named equity partners were much more likely than those named non-equity partners to report mentoring by partners (84% compared to 63%).

Virtually all of the respondents reported receiving challenging work assignments on a regular basis (98%), but equity partners were much more likely to report that they “always” received such work than were non-equity partners (61% compared to 39%). Females were more likely than males to report that they “always” or “almost always” received frequent feedback on their work (57% and 44% respectively).

Respondents reported generally positive relationships and levels of collegiality with both associates and partners. Males and equity partners were most likely to report that relationships with their peer associates were “always” highly collegial. Males and females reported little if any difference in their relationships with partners, with more than three-quarters of each group reporting that these relationships were “always” or “almost always” highly collegial.