A recent IBA webinar examined how junior lawyers can best be supported on their paths towards career progression. In-House Perspective reports on the key points.

In an increasingly complex and fast-paced legal environment, senior lawyers have an integral role to play in affording young lawyers the opportunities to grow their profile and gain increased exposure to working with clients. That was the view expressed by Pranav Srivastava, Co-Vice Chair of the IBA Young Lawyers’ Committee (YLC), as he opened a recent IBA webinar, ‘Young lawyers and leadership.’

The webinar, which took place in July, was presented by the YLC alongside the IBA Women Lawyers’ Committee, the IBA Senior Lawyers’ Committee and the IBA Law Firm Management Committee. It was supported by the IBA Academic and Professional Development Committee.

‘Leadership in law is not just about titles or seniority. It’s about influence. It’s about responsibility, the ability to shape teams, clients, and institutions,’ said Srivastava, who’s also a partner with Phoenix Legal in New Delhi. There are many facets of a young lawyer’s journey towards leadership, he explained, such as navigating the formative years of practice, building meaningful relationships with mentors and peers and appreciating how leadership evolves into learning.

When embarking on a legal career, it’s important to become invested in the work you’re doing, said Brittany Libson, a lawyer at Skadden in New York. ‘If you care about your work, the work product is much better.’

Seeking feedback from superiors, she said, is crucial – if sometimes difficult. ‘More senior lawyers tend to worry that if they give negative feedback, junior lawyers will view that as criticism. However, even now, after any assignment I ask what could I have done differently [and/or] better and view it as constructive criticism because no matter what phase you are in your career, you can always improve.’

Organisation is key for young lawyers, said Reginaldo Sorrenti, a senior associate at Veirano Advogados in São Paulo. ‘If you’re closing a transaction, keep all the documents organised, be on top of emails and check you have the latest draft being discussed,’ he said. ‘It doesn’t matter if you’re a genius, if at closing, you forgot about the POA [power of attorney], the closing will not happen.’

Young lawyers often don’t understand how much agency they have in dictating their own careers, said Adrianna Finger, a lawyer at Debevoise & Plimpton in New York. ‘If you want to do a certain project, work with a certain person, learn a certain skill, it never hurts to ask. It doesn’t mean you’re going to get it right then, but if you continue to raise your hand for things, those things will eventually come.’

Jennifer Schubert, a partner at MoloLamken in New York who moderated the webinar, said an email from somebody asking to be on one of her cases helps that individual stay at the top of her mind. ‘But what really stands out is somebody marching into my office, and saying, “I’d really love to work with you. Can you keep me in mind?” There’s an effectiveness in this approach that can sometimes be forgotten in a virtual world,’ she said.

It’s important to make yourself indispensable with whatever your strength is, Schubert added. ‘It may be owning the facts because you’re a natural for facts, or it may be you’re an excellent writer and always on top of taking the first stab at an outline or draft. Those things make me think I’m going to continue to go to this person and then commensurate with that are the opportunities,’ she explained.

Junior lawyers should also be invested in taking smaller steps to progress, said Finger.  ‘Asking if you can help with [a senior’s] business development, presentations, research or any other project, helps with the building blocks of trust. If you keep raising your hand and showing you’re a person they can depend on in any capacity, you’re going to get those opportunities that are really on your radar down the line.’

The influence of senior lawyers

Senior lawyers that take more control of the team, make younger colleagues push themselves, give them opportunities and open doors to interesting cases are best at progressing juniors, said Sorrenti. ‘This is not always easy,’ he added. ‘However, if you take the small tasks, pay attention to what you’re doing and always try to seek the best of yourself, you start building trust with the senior lawyers, and doors start opening.’

It’s great for junior lawyers to be given a particular task and an opportunity to take ownership, said Kevin Nordin, counsel at Ropes & Gray in London, but there’s also a benefit to being able to see the bigger picture. ‘Being able to attend client meetings and calls, see how more senior lawyers are engaging with clients and discussing not just the legal side of things, but also the commercial considerations, can yield benefits,’ he said.

It’s important for young lawyers to remember that ‘all the great things you may have done to get you where you are today, may not be the same things you need to do to take the next step in your career,’ added Nordin. Your career and the expectations of you are always evolving. ‘In the early days, it may be things like attention to detail that’s key,’ he said. ‘That will obviously always be key to your continued development, but over time, no-one is checking on your attention to detail. The expectation may shift and you may need to do things like building up expertise in a particular area of law.’

If you take time early on to focus on teaching and mentoring junior attorneys to learn, to think about the bigger picture of the task they’re handling and how it fits into the case, that reaps benefits down the road, said Libson. ‘We don’t always know all the angles that might come up on an assignment. And one way a junior attorney can really add value is by raising issues that maybe a senior attorney didn’t think about.’

Awarding credit to a junior lawyer when it’s due is important, she said, but client-facing relationships are too. ‘Where a junior handles a task, it’s good to allow them to send that work product off to the client and attend client calls. Giving them direct contact is a key way to help juniors get the exposure they need to grow,’ explained Libson.

Maintaining good relationships with peers is also important for junior lawyers, said Schubert. ‘In time, your peers will be the ones positioned to give out business or refer a conflict matter. It’s about maintaining and enjoying that connection and being helpful to each other on opportunities that are not necessarily lucrative, but are meaningful.’