The demographics of law firms are changing as baby boomers reduce, or intend to reduce, active involvement in their firms. This change of status of senior partners has highlighted the need for managing partners to assess their firms’ current culture to ensure it conforms to the professional and personal objectives of a significant majority of the midlevel and younger partners, who are the future of their firms.
A law firm’s culture can be one of its major strengths, when it is consistent with the current and longer term objectives and values of a majority of the partners. But a culture that prevents individual attorneys from satisfying their professional, personal and financial objectives, and that inhibits a firm from meeting its competitive threats, or adapting to changing economic environments, can lead to the firm’s stagnation and decline, unless its partners make a conscious effort to change.
