Advice for a sole practitioner who has repeatedly lost associates: shift thinking from short-term help to potential successor, clarify career paths, align compensation and management exposure, and create real ownership or leadership opportunities.
Offer a clear total-compensation and career-advancement plan—competitive pay plus bonuses, benefits, development, client contact, and a path to ownership or leadership.
Gradually involve a successor candidate in firm management and financial matters so they can run the business before taking it over.
A sole owner in Indianapolis with 45 years of practice has tried hiring associates repeatedly but sees them leave after training. The office has one lawyer, a receptionist, and a paralegal who doubles as office manager and bookkeeper. The owner wants to reduce workload and retire eventually.
If retirement is foreseeable, stop viewing an associate only as help. Consider that your next hire could be a future successor. Recruiting, compensation, training, management exposure, and retention should all reflect that possibility. When you recruit with succession in mind, you attract people who want responsibility and a future rather than short-term employment.
Don't assume pay is the only reason. After a few years, associates typically ask: What is my future here? Will I gain responsibility, develop clients, influence decisions, and see compensation growth? If those answers are unclear, associates will look elsewhere. Determine the reasons past associates left so you can address real gaps.
Compensation and total-reward design
The opportunity for partnership or ownership can be more attractive than a slightly higher salary for the right candidate, especially if retirement is on the horizon.
Ask about the associate's ambitions
Be transparent about the firm's future
You don't have to set a firm retirement date if it's uncertain, but you should communicate that you're building the firm for the long term and want to develop lawyers who can assume responsibility. Associates who see a genuine future opportunity are likelier to invest in the firm.
Progressively involve associates in management
A potential successor needs to learn the business side of the practice. Over time, expose them to financial management, billing and collections, staffing, compensation, technology, marketing, client development, budgeting, vendor relationships, and firm policies. Full access isn't required immediately, but build management capability long before transition.
If you want to retain an associate until retirement or hand the practice over, change how you recruit and manage. Offer a real career path, competitive and structured compensation, early conversations about long-term goals, and progressive management responsibility so an associate can step into leadership when you step away.
Many rural attorneys, often the only lawyer in town, work until they die or simply close their practices when they retire. But small to mid-sized firms looking to expand into rural markets could help to make succession planning a real possibility for these solo practitioners.
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