Credit: Roberto Jiménez

When Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom's new associates show up for their first few weeks at the firm, they have little interaction outside of their cohort. Instead of billing hours, taking on work from partners or handling client matters, Skadden associates instead focus on learning about the firm's culture and values, brushing up on business basics and getting to know one another.

"This is the most of their undivided attention we'll ever have, and we take advantage of it," Jodie Garfinkel, Skadden's director of attorney development and professional personnel, says.

For Skadden, reaching new associates during their first few weeks is not only paramount for a smooth onboarding process, but it's also the important first step in the firm's associate training program, which stretches to include programming for midlevel and senior associates, as well as continuing education for of counsel and new partners.

Since the Great Recession, law firms of all sizes have invested more time and resources than ever before into training their associates, whom they view as a critical component of their future success. And as the legal market in recent years has become more competitive, robust associate training programs focused on developing professional skills have become a key recruitment and retention tool to entice bright, young talent to a firm—and an asset to clients looking for more from their legal service providers.

"Law firms have realized the sink-or-swim approach doesn't work, especially in a tight talent market," Grover Cleveland, a lawyer and author who wrote an advice book for early-career attorneys called "Swimming Lessons for Baby Sharks," says. "Incoming associates want fast-paced, interactive training, and you have to explain what the long-term benefit is. Lawyers understand the skills they develop as associates will be with them for the rest of their lives and support them in whatever endeavors they do."

Most firms have always had some sort of onboarding process for their new attorneys, but it's only in the last decade or so that professional development roles and more thorough associate training programs have really blossomed, explains Jeannie CaBell, a recruiter at Rifkin Consulting who has worked in-house directing attorney recruitment at multiple Am Law 200 firms. She says new attorney orientation used to be only a day or two, and focused on teaching associates to use a firm's computer system or, in some cases, assigning them a mentor.

"Years ago, there wasn't a position called professional development at law firms. They began to be incorporated just before the recession started, so [firms] could use them as a recruiting tool," CaBell says. "Now, [associate training] has exploded, and the onboarding process actually includes professional development skills."

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At Skadden, Jen Pangione, the firm's assistant director of attorney ­development training, says there was always demand for more development opportunities, but in the period after the Great Recession, the firm devoted more time and resources to getting associates off to a strong start.

"We saw the recession as an opportunity—when we weren't as crazy busy—to implement the things people asked us for and that we always wanted to do, but now had more time for," she says.

That eventually took shape as the firm's associate comprehensive education, or ACE, program, a three-and-a-half-week onboarding process for new associates to learn about the firm and its values, as well as to jumpstart their professional development training before partners and clients start piling on the responsibilities. Pangione says that rather than reiterate things associates already learn in law school, the ACE program focuses on professional skills they likely didn't cover: leadership, time management, communication skills, conflict resolution and other factors that can propel a competent, early-career attorney into a valuable business professional.

Bruce Alltop, a consultant at LawVision, says he's seen a dramatic increase in associate training at firms of all sizes. And firms are focusing on business development skills earlier in an attorney's career than ever before.

"Junior associates are still going to be expected to deliver high-quality work and bill time," Alltop says. "It's never too early to start developing your network. Actually, that should have started yesterday."

Firms realized in recent years that their attorneys could be further along by the time they made partner if they received the requisite business development training at the associate level, Alltop says. At first, they focused on development for junior partners and then senior associates, but over time large firms have come to understand the long process of building a multimillion-dollar book of business needs to start earlier.

"I see a migration downstream and more emphasis on younger groups," he says. "When you're a partner, you don't want to be thrown into the deep end of the pool."

Pangione at Skadden says treating associate training holistically is important because it keeps associates motivated and looking toward the future.

"[Skadden] takes a longitudinal look at associate training," she says. "The associates get to see not just what we are currently learning, but what they have to look forward to."

CaBell, the recruiter, explains that this is one of the biggest changes in associate training during the last decade: Associates have come to expect competitive professional development opportunities as part of their training, which may include targeted development based on practices areas, more structured mentorship programs and a holistic approach to growth.

"Associates would really like to have a definitive growth path, and they really want to go to firms where they can work together to enhance and achieve their career goals," CaBell says.

Jeanne Picht, director of professional development at Fried, Frank, Harris, Shriver & Jacobson, says the last economic cycle had a significant influence on the desire for more associate training, as well as associates' increased appetite for professional development.

"The Great Recession drove a heightened need for professional development skills," she says, adding that potential hires now ask detailed questions about her firm's associate training programs and professional development offerings. "Associates want to develop professional skills they can take anywhere if they need or want to. They really want to know if they will continue to learn, grow and keep their skills up to date."

Associate training has also extended into health and wellness topics, CaBell says. She finds that associates are growing more interested in professional development training focused on time management, work-life balance, communication and other ways they can remain happy and healthy in their personal life in order to bring the best version of themselves to work.

Comprehensive associate training programs like these can make early-career attorneys feel like valued team members. CaBell says associates looking to leave their firms often want to do so because they don't feel adequately supported, or that firms aren't investing enough in them.

"A lot of times, that's why associates make a move—they're perhaps not getting the professional development training they desire," she says. "If they have the opportunity, they may take their talents elsewhere to get the training."

Even when training programs are robust, associates still struggle to balance participation in professional development with partner expectations and client matters, law firm professional staff say.

"Especially in the last 10 years, associates are 24/7—constantly on call and expected to respond at all times," Kelli Dunaway, director of learning and development at St. Louis-based Bryan Cave Leighton Paisner, says. "The reality of our incentive structures, where the only thing that matters is how much you bill to the client, is that there are contradictions and competing demands that make associate training difficult."

Firms of all sizes say one of the biggest challenges of associate training is actually getting associates to participate in professional development opportunities, especially when considering their legal demands. At Bryan Cave, Dunaway says integrating microlearning—short games, videos and on-demand, digital training offerings—has been a game changer.

"If you offer off-the-shelf courses and 50-minute lunch-and-learns, those people aren't going to feel invested in," she says. "The average person has about a 20-minute attention span, and for lawyers, it's 18 minutes."

At Fried Frank, Picht says coaching has been successful. The firm has an internal coach on staff to work with associates; it also keeps a roster of external coaches on-call. The firm also recently began a new group mentoring program for associates in their first three years. A partner mentors a group of six to 10 associates with the help of a midlevel associate liaison who can translate the perspectives of both the partners and the associate groups.

"This is not a forum where we want them to discuss how to practice M&A law," Picht says. "This is solely focused on professional skills."

Mentoring has also played a greater role in Skadden's associate training in recent years, especially once the ACE program—those few weeks of uninterrupted associate training—has ended. And while professional development experts agree that the best mentor-mentee relationships grow organically, that doesn't always happen for young attorneys from underrepresented groups, explains Melique Jones, head of diversity and inclusion at Skadden.

"For diverse attorneys, there's an extra focus on mentorship," Jones says. "Our mentorship program there is more intentional, but it still strikes a balance without being overly formal."

Jones says developing more structured elements in its mentorship program for diverse attorneys pushed the firm's professional development staff to implement that approach firmwide. A willingness to do things differently helps keep an associate training program useful.

"We spend a lot of time asking for feedback and assessing our programming," says Garfinkel, Skadden's director of attorney development and training. "It's always a moving target, but that's a good thing."

"We're not assuming what people need," Jones adds. "We're getting their input."

In a tight talent market, associates themselves may be driving the changes to their own training, but the evolution of the process still offers a clear benefit to firms. Picht says it's all part of the growing power clients hold over their firms since the Great Recession. An enhanced focus on client service has led to a desire for more training at the associate level so younger attorneys are prepared to pitch in to help with client needs.

"Clients believed first-year associates didn't add enough value and became less willing to pay for the training of junior associates," Picht says. "This put pressure on law firms to really train and develop associates as quickly as possible and understand client services holistically."

If client satisfaction is the ultimate goal, then a more thorough and thoughtful approach to associate training is helping law firms get where they're going.

"Clients are telling the partners they are impressed with the readiness of our associates," Garfinkel says. "When the clients are seeing the value, that's when it matters and you know it was money well spent."

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