Almost Half of Partners Don’t Fully Trust Their Peers

AI, Geopolitical Volatility, Client Demands, and Finding Laterals are stealing leadership mindshare – but one risk outshines them all: Partner confidence in each other.

And it’s headed the wrong way for law firms.

In 2023, 12.9% of partners said they do not trust their partners. Fast forward to 1,000 responses from our latest partner survey – and it’s just shy of doubling at 21.2%.

And this could be the tip of the iceberg. The new research reveals the following confidence levels in their partners:

• Full Trust: 18.3%
• Working Trust: 36.4%
• Verify Before Believing: 24.1%
• Rogue Partners: 21.2%

Full Trust drives elite performance. The partners believe their peers will do the right thing for the firm. It’s full speed ahead.

But – fewer than 1 in 5 partners express complete confidence in their peers. More than 80% stop short of saying they fully trust the people helping run the firm – not enough to drive elite performance.

Working Trust delivers good performance. People believe their partners will generally do the right thing. If it feels right – they will believe and dive in.

Verify Before Believing – much closer to no confidence. The partners question what they hear, question strategy, and have little faith in their work product.

Rogue Partners operate outside the system. They create their own rules and priorities. They have their own version of strategy. And they are usually tolerated – and even celebrated – as long as they bring in the business.

They have little use for their colleagues’ work product and largely keep their issues to themselves. They view strategic mandates as options and are comfortable operating on their own path.

They represent 1 in 5 partners – enough to influence culture, slow decisions, derail execution, and weaken the very behaviors firms depend on to grow. They are often silent in their views and can be hard to spot if you are not actively looking for them – until it’s too late.

Every firm has rogue partners. The difference is scale. At 5%, they’re a nuisance. At 21.2%, they’re shaping culture and influencing decisions. Worse yet – they are teaching more junior attorneys the absolute wrong lessons. All this creates cultural chaos and drains both energy and profits. It is the biggest risk to almost any firm.

The good news? Firms can build trust faster than they think. It won’t happen through retreats and occasional jaw boning. It happens through shared work, shared accountability, and shared success. Here are 3 proven strategies:

1. Assign small groups of partners to solve a high-priority firm issue within 6–8 weeks. Give them authority, visibility, and a deadline. Nothing builds trust faster than accomplishing something meaningful together. Potential topics include: increasing partner trust, igniting business development, improving associate satisfaction and retention, and selecting targets as new clients. Ask each group to present their results to the Executive Committee and the firm.
2. Measure and publicize collaborations. This can be between practices, offices, associates, and partner/associate efforts. They don’t have to be wildly successful because the behavior is the message. Few things are more powerful than public recognition.
3. Create opportunities for partners to work together. Assign 2 partners to big pursuits, create a rotating committee of partners to anticipate the needs of top clients, and define topics for breakthrough thought leadership. Include associates in every effort as well.

Most firms try to build trust through communication. The highest-performing firms build trust through behavior. Trust is the operating system of any partnership. Its absence prevents institutionalizing clients, collaboration, mentoring, shared knowledge, and business development.

The greatest threat to a law firm is not losing clients. It’s losing faith in each other. Clients can feel it and silently withdraw.