Meeker, Needham & Ames, a long-established metropolitan law firm, employs 100 associates and 20 partners and is preeminent in corporate litigation. Each year, the promotions committee nominates associates for promotion. This year, the partner nominations carried particular weight; MN&A's overall billings and partner incomes were stagnating, showing the effects of intensified competition and in-house corporate counsel. The three associates under consideration had all worked for the firm seven years, meeting the minimum requirement for partner.

Chairing the meeting was George Hartwig, 53, for three years the managing partner. Also on the committee were Maury Davidson, 62, a senior partner and managing partner for seven years before Hartwig; Pamela Fisher, 44, a tax law specialist and the only female partner; and Jim Welch, 47, director of litigation.

The day after the meeting, Hartwig circulated the minutes. Memos from Fisher and Davidson appeared on Hartwig's desk the same day.

Should Meeker, Needham & Ames make Julie Ross a partner?

Sally C. Landaueris a partner at Ball, Janik & Novack, a Portland, Oregon law firm, where she has worked a four-day week for the past eight years. At a previous firm, she was one of the first part-time partners on the West Coast.

Meeker, Needham & Ames is a law firm in trouble. It is an associate mill, grinding out young lawyers so rapidly that by the seventh year, only 3 of its 100 associates are left to be considered for partnership.

This should be an economic disaster for the firm. It means that each year it must hire some two to three dozen new associates. Even its second-year associate load must be very heavy. John P. Weil, an Orinda, California law firm consultant, warns that the first-year cost of hiring an associate fresh from law school is$100,000. That includes capital costs, but it also takes into consideration revenue generated. If MN&A hires 30 new associates, it will spend$3,000,000. MN&A cannot afford to lose Julie Rossdespite her part-time statusbecause she is, by admission of the partnership committee, a client getter.

The committee, however, focused on how Ross's partnership would affect firm perceptions and policies on part-time work in general. The two partners arguing against Ross focused only on her lack of "dedication" to the firm. Pam Fisher, in particular, confuses Ross's part-time schedule with a lack of motivation and dedication. As a mother of three who tried for four years to be a full-time lawyer and an adequate mother, I can assure Fisher that motivation and dedication are not the problem. Despite my present four-day-a-week schedule, I have developed sufficient expertise and enough clients to be asked to join three firms as a partner.

What are the firm's options? Having made the initial mistake of not establishing Julie Ross's position on or off the partnership track at the time she requested part-time status, there are still a number of ways the firm can make Ross a partner. It can:

1. Delay her partnership by an amount of time equivalent to her reduced number of hours. A delay of a year and a half (50%of the three years of part-time work) would enable Ross to reassess whether to stay on a part-time basis at the end of that time or return to full-time work.

2. Establish an income partnership. This option is becoming more common in law firms around the country as competition squeezes profits and as more lawyers reject the 70-hour-a-week work schedule that has traditionally aided partnership entry. With this kind of partnership, Ross would be entitled to partnership status, a guaranteed income rather than points and profit sharing, and the right to vote on all matters except points (compensation) for partners and mergers. She would have no equity investment. She would not share in upside potential, but she would not be exposed to risk, either.

3. Establish a nonequity partnership in which part-time partners participate in profit and loss but make no capital investment and share in none of the firm's assets.

4. Make Ross an equity partner, but establish her level of compensation and investment at 50%of the lowest level of the average compensation of the partners who entered the class ahead of her, her class, and the class behind her. Her points would be determined in the same manner. She would always be compensated less than others similarly situated, but that is the price she must pay for the privilege of part-time status.

5. Make her a nonequity partner for five years, with a move up to equity after that time.

One final note. A litigation-only firm will have more difficulty with part-time associates and part-time partners than a business or transactional firm; court appearances, depositions, and trials frequently cannot be arranged around a part-time schedule. A transactional attorney, on the other hand, can often arrange his or her practice around the part-time schedule.

Losing Ross means throwing years of investment down the hole.

To be competitive in today's recruiting marketplace, MN&A must change its policies. It is throwing years of investment down the hole if it rejects Julie Ross as a partner. She will have no choice but to seek employment elsewhere, taking her considerable skills and her obviously growing practice with her. MN&A cannot afford to lose Julie Ross or to set a precedent that part-time is a career dead end.

Marsha E. Simmsis a partner at Weil, Gotshal & Manges, a New York City law firm.

My gut reaction as a woman was that of course Julie Ross should become a partner at MN&A. But when I considered the issue in light of the realities of today's law firms and businesses, I concluded that she should not. A partner in any professional firm has to have made a conscious decision to have a career. Julie Ross has decided she wants a jobnot a career.

Julie Ross wants a jobnot a career.

Part-time partnership raises important issues for clients, peers (male and female), and other women in the firm.

The firm's clients.While there will be some clients who can work within a part-time partner's time constraints, most clients expect a partner to be available whenever needed. A partner also has to be willing to work to expand the client base and to work with any client of the firm who needs that person's expertise. Julie Ross wants to limit her practice to meeting the needs of onlyherclients (so long as those needs are not full-time), not the firm's.

The part-time partner's peers.Without a doubt, making someone a partner who has not "suffered" as much as his or her peers creates resentment in the partnership. While most lawyers have reached a point where they accept "stopping out" for a limited period for whatever reason (maternity leave or a sabbatical, for instance), they expect their partners to be the people who have made and are willing to continue to make the same commitment as they have to the firm over an extended period. If someone is not willing to make that commitment, then peers will question whether that person should be given a status that symbolizes the commitment.

Other women in the firm.Most women who have attained a level of professional success have done so by consciously sacrificing other aspects of their liveswhether it be marriage, children, or community involvement. They have discovered that theycan'thave it all and have had to choose what they want most. Creating a new set of partnership criteria for part-time associates, most of whom will be women, risks alienating women who have earned their status in the traditional way and have made the sacrifices Julie Ross was unwilling to make. Such a policy might also imply that women should be judged by a different, less demanding set of criteria, which brings into question the competency and commitment of all professional women.

I am not suggesting, however, that MN&A reject for all time the possibility of making Julie Ross a partner. If she ever returns to work full-time, then she should be considered for partnership. If at that time she is still performing at the same level that she is now, she should be made a partner.

MN&A could have avoided its dilemma by discussing with Julie Ross (and then making it a part of its announced policy) at what point, if any, an associate who works part-time would be considered for partnership. Unfortunately, most firms have no policy on part-time employment or other nontraditional work roles and instead treat each case on an ad hoc basis. This approach makes it difficult for those who are contemplating a part-time arrangement to evaluate how it might affect their futures. Also, the resulting disparate treatment of different part-time requests creates its own set of problems.

The most workable policy in a law firm, therefore, is one in which associates are permitted to take leaves of absence or work part-time schedules with the understanding that they will have to return to work full-time before they can be considered for partnership. For those who do not want to be considered for partnership, the firm should try to work out a mutually satisfactory schedule. As one MN&A partner mentioned, the firm cannot afford to lose intelligent lawyers because of its unwillingness to be flexible.

Walter R. Trosinis vice president of strategy and development for Merck & Co., Inc., where he oversees personnel and human resources planning, strategy, policy, and development activities worldwide.

This case raises an important question: Given that most employees who are parents have a spouse who also works, how can companies address the needs of employees who have dual obligations?

The issue goes beyond partnership to the whole question of work and families.

In Julie Ross's case, MN&A could not begin to answer this question because it did not think through the implications of her part-time arrangement at the time it was made. George Hartwig should have, for instance, asked Ross what kinds of expectations she had from the firm and whether she would be willing to make child-care arrangements when emergencies arose at work. And he should have let her know the extent of the firm's commitment to her and what chance she had for partnership.

At this point, the firm can at least revisit the terms of the agreement it made with Ross. For instance, did a part-time schedule mean she would be working 25 hours a week or 40? This will also force the firm to examine its requirements for partner. Given the reality of pressures from an increasingly stressful world outside the office, including but not limited to family obligations, is MN&A (and other businesses) really benefiting from a tradition of working its employees 70 hours a week?

Within MN&A's present culture of "hit the ground running and keep your nose to the grindstone," I would be very reluctant to make Ross a full-time partner. In such a firm, it would send a signal that hard work is not necessary to move forward. Still, MN&A should discuss with Ross the possibility of granting her a limited partnership status or allowing her to share her partnership with another person who has a similar arrangement.

At Merck, we base promotion decisions on how well individuals perform and on our judgment of their ability to perform at a higher level. We expect people to work hard and to be dedicatedbut we do not expect them to give up their families. In fact, I believe (as Maury Davidson implies in his memo) that workers are most effective when they do not work constantly.

As is the case with a growing number of companies, Merck has part-time work policiesand we have found that they have unexpected payoffs: for example, part-time employees frequently focus more on task completion and getting jobs done rather than simply on attendance. And doing the job, after all, is what we pay employees for.

Nevertheless, it is only nonmanagers that work part-time at Merck; we don't have managerial part-time work. It would be very difficult for a senior manager to work part-time because, let's face it, supervising is a full-time job. The only possible way managers could work part-time is on a job-sharing basis. The rules here are still emerging; Merck, for instance, has not yet dealt with this. Given the increasing need in our diverse work force for more flexible approaches, however, we may have to address this sooner rather than later.

Barbara Mendel Maydenpractices law in New York City and is a member of the American Bar Association Commission on Women in the Profession.

Never mind hours worked; what about talent, efficiency, and values?

Let me get this straight. Julie Ross has displayed exemplary performance as a lawyer, and unlike her colleague Tim Brower who is being nominated for promotion, she has demonstrated revenue-generation skills. She passes the tests articulated by the firm.

Why should the number of hours Ross works, an arrangement approved by the firm, determine whether she should be made a partner? Is it some sort of initiation rite? While a firm may decide that the attributes it is looking for in a partner may take longer to attain working part-time, when those criteria are met, what does a threshold number of hours add to that equation?

Experience, expertise, and other effects of tenure that Ross gained while working an alternative schedule should not fall into a black hole. She is a lawyer who has attained skills, has garnered firm and client respect, and has presumably done herpro ratashare ofpro bono,community service, and firm administration. She should accordingly be promoted.

Yet Pam Fisher argues that because she and her colleagues worked 70-hour weeks, so should anyone who comes up behind them. Fisher's memory may be a little clouded by fatigue; legal management firms tell us that the billable-hour spiral is much higher than this. In the late 1970s, average annual billables for associates hovered around 1,700 hours, which today would be considered "part-time" compared with the more than 2,000 billable hours associates now average.

So should Ross, who bills, say, 1,500 hours a year working part-time, take home the same amount of money as Brower, who bills 3,000 hours? Of course not. (After all, the 3,000-hour-a-year lawyer will likely have alimony and child support to pay.) Hours worked may be relevant to the size of Ross's piece of the pie but not to her ability to sit down at the table.

Jim Welch believes that the firm needs a young, hard-working, committed attorney for a model. But maybe the focus of that model ought instead to be talent, efficiency, and values. Reporter Marilyn Goldstein, in an article appearing last year inNew York Newsday,wrote:

"The question should not be what's wrong with a woman who doesn't want to work 12-hour days but what's wrong with a man who doesand a culture that...applauds, glorifies, promotes people who put their jobs before their families... This penchant for promotions via...overtime reflects an assumption that those willing to work long hours are the best and brightest (but) maybe the ones willing to work long hours are just the ones willing to work long hours... What if we discover the answer to moving American commerce and industry ahead is finding those smart enoughnotto work 12-hour days and turning the reins of business over to them? Who knows, we might come up with a mother lode of talent."

Implicit in the discussion about whether to make Ross a partner is that it is uneconomic to do so. Some of the most successful law firms in the country, however, have shown that alternative work schedules that don't "mommy track" women into pink-collar, no-room-for-advancement ghettos can be profitable. Those firms report that their reduced-schedule lawyersboth partners and associatesdemonstrate increased productivity with a higher ratio of billable hours to hours worked. Fixed costs relating to such lawyers can be reduced. Fears about part-time partners being unable to supervise or to deal with client concerns have not been borne out; more often than not, the partner on an alternative work schedule is more accessible than the 2,500-hour-a-year workaholic juggling too many matters.

Firms that don't provide a work environment where family and professional responsibilities can be reconciled will lose their most valuable resourcesmany of their best peopleto firms that are more "family friendly." Retention of valued, experienced professionals produces distinct value. Firm costs escalate with lawyer turnover. When firms don't offer options, they lose lawyers just when they have become profitable. (It has been noted that a woman professional's most productive years are also her reproductive years.) Clients become frustrated finding their matters constantly being shifted to new lawyers unfamiliar with their circumstances.

How firms deal with balancing family and work responsibilities is not just a women's issue, as Maury Davidson points out in the case. Perhaps women were the first to notice these issues, but what is becoming increasingly evident is that men are now leaving firms in greater numbers. No longer is the prototypical new lawyer a man who was put through school by a working wife who remains at home after her husband becomes a lawyer and devotes herself to providing her husband and children with a well-organized home life. Today both women and men are dealing with more responsibilities at home, in addition to those at the office. Men are increasingly opting out of those firms that cultivate an obvious "bottom-line only" environment. The managing partner of a major New York law firm recently noted that even men who don't intend to work part-time or take parental leave look for these kinds of policies in firms because they reveal how much importance a firm places on family issues.

Jim Welch is naive to think that without flexible policies, MN&A will continue to attract young lawyers of the quality of Fisher and Brower. While the lure of the big money was once all-powerful, law students are now becoming aware of the down-side of a law firm environment where a 2,500-hour-billable year expectation is not uncommon. In evaluating law firms, they are looking beyond the highest bidder and at the importance of lifestyle and family issues.

Pam Fisher is concerned about the message the firm will send by making Julie Ross a partner. With proper guidance from the top (and a written policy clearly articulating the firm's reasoning and the parameters of the policy), the other associates and potential recruits will see that Ross is a hard-working lawyer who has excelled in her field and who has traded the extra hours demanded of others for a significant cut in pay and benefits. And they will see MN&A as an organization that has responded to the demographics of the 1990s and that understands the importance of maintaining human values in a busy, successful legal practice.

D. Timothy Hallis a professor of organizational behavior and associate dean for faculty development in the school of management at Boston University. He is the author of several books on career management.

It is crucial at this point in MN&A's history that it take innovative action: it should promote Julie Ross.

First, let's look at the state of affairs for law firms and businesses alike. The emergence of global marketing and technological innovations means that our world has never been more competitive. And the most competitive assets for any business, as the saying goes, leave the building each night (however late the departure might be!). The only way to grow a business in these uncertain times is through a clear strategy of recruiting and grooming the finest talent available.

MN&A's three central criteria in evaluating partner candidates are: (1) legal performance, (2) commitment to the firm's work, and (3) client service and ability to generate new business. There is no doubt that Ross's performance is outstanding on the first and third criteria. But she has also been outstanding in the second areawhen measured against the expected commitment level the firm negotiated with her. Furthermore, based on what George Hartwig says, Ross is the kind of lawyer who is committed to do whatever it takes to serve a given client, regardless of the number of hours a week she has agreed to work.

MN&A has to redefine the word "commitment" to mean whatever it takes to meet client needsnot a particular number of hours spent at the office each week. It must then let everyone at the firm know that this new commitment toservice(rather thanhours) will be its major strategic advantage. In effect, this will create a new psychological contract between the firm and its staff: if an employee performs well, shows commitment and flexibility, and opens up new areas of business, the firm will provide financial rewards, professional growth opportunities, a long-term relationship, and flexible work options.

For MN&A's current partners, this means new rules. MN&A acknowledged that the rules had changed when it implemented flexible work for associates. The rules have had to change because the game has changed: employees in all business realms are needing and insisting on more flexibility.

The rules must change because the game has changed.

The most important thing is to make changes discussable. MN&A employees need information about what to expect under the new contract. For example, employees working part-time may need to modify their career goals and expect to be promoted more slowly than their full-time counterparts.

As part of this communication process, MN&A will also need to give suitable recognition to its current partners who made family trade-offs so they could serve the firm full-time. George Hartwig needs to let people like Pam Fisher and Tim Brower know how much he values their contributions and that he realizes that they had fewer options. As MN&A communicates its new career contract more widely, inside and outside the firm, not only will it retain and develop key assets like Julie Ross but it will also be better able to attract other women and men of her caliber who want a work-family balance that other firms aren't yet offering.

This kind of new contract is an opportunity for a business to create a strategic human-resource-development plan. This would entail examining future needs for skills and experience, the extent to which those needs are already being met, what gaps exist, and a plan for addressing those gaps by recruiting, selecting, developing, retaining, and rewarding future staff.

A staff task force could be appointed to work on this plan. It could survey clients to assess their future needs, and it could survey staff at all levels to assess career and personal needs. The task force could then develop an overall plan with policy recommendations addressing issues like flexible work arrangements, career timetables, compensation and benefit policies, career coaching and mentoring, and dependent care. The plan could be communicated and discussed with all staff in a variety of settingsregular staff meetings, a company newsletter, partner meetings, or "brown bag" lunch seminars.

Included in such a plan could be a lengthened timetable for part-timers. If a major objection to Ross's candidacy is that she has not yet done the same volume of work as her full-time peers, MN&A might require her to work additional years until she has.

Similarly, it might establish different levels of partnership to deal with the compensation issue and the concern that part-time partners might bring in less new business. One level would be fully participating partners who would share in the profits of the firm. A second level would be salaried partners who would not share in firm profits. Salaried partners could be either part-timers or technical specialists who would not generate business; in addition to lower financial return, they would have the advantage of lower risk since they would not sign firm loans or otherwise participate in the firm's investments. A few Boston law firms have already adopted this structure, and public accounting firms have implemented comparable structures.

Another option might be to allow employees to move from one level to another as their circumstances change. In addition to keeping the full-partner role open for part-timers, this could also be a way for older, fully participating partners to phase gradually into retirement or to continue working longer than they otherwise wouldwithout the pressures of full-profit participation and contribution.

Regardless of what the new plan includes, the key is to make it discussable. This should be easy in a firm the size of MN&A. George Hartwig should act quickly to meet the needs of both the staff and the firm and use this opportunity to gain a strategic advantage over competitors.

Above is a case study (The case of the part-time partner)

Answer the following questions

-Should Julie Ross be made a partner? Why?

-What exactly is the merit-based criteria that MN&A is expecting a partner to fulfill (e.g., billable hours, revenue generation, new clientele)?

-Does Mr. Brewer demonstrate competence in the areas that MN&A claims are important for a partner? By supporting his candidacy for promotion what signal is MN&A sending to other associates in the firm?

-Does Ms. Ross demonstrate competence in the areas that MN&A claims are important for a partner? By debating over her candidacy for promotion what signal is MN&A sending to other associates in the firm?

-The debate over Ross' candidacy arises as some partners are concerned that it will result in negative repercussions while the partners are optimistic that it will attract talented associates who favor work/life balance.

-Is this debate then about Ross' ability and competence or a lack of agreement over MN&A's organizational culture (i.e., a traditional litigation firm which is all about the billable hours vs. a modern legal firm that values the work-life balance of its employees)?

-How will this lack of agreement among top management executives affect employee morale?