Partner Compensation
and Profit Sharing
Particularly in professional services partnerships, profit sharing and compensation systems must reflect the firm's competitive landscape, maturity and profitability while respecting internal relativities related to all partners’ contributions to the partnership's success. And often these contributions go well beyond simple revenue metrics and cash paid in.
Over the last 15 years, I’ve helped more than 50 Managing Partners, Boards and Remuneration Committees worldwide evolve their firms’ partner reward and profit sharing systems. This work has been across the professional services spectrum, including legal, accounting and consulting; clients have ranged from complex, global partnerships of more than 1,000 partners to small, single-location partnerships that are just starting out.
Top 5 questions my clients ask
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Is our compensation structure working? Does it help us retain our best partners, and is it attractive to lateral hires?
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Are we focussed on the right KPIs?
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We are spending an extraordinary amount of time on the annual compensation process. How do we operate our system efficiently, minimizing time and resources?
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How do reward partners who are in firm management, who are true global experts, who are out there in the community?
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How do we balance reward for across different practices and service lines, where pricing and profitability may differ?
My approach to partner reward systems
Partner reward systems don’t exist in isolation – context matters. The firm’s maturity, complexity, strategy, business model and partnership structure all matter. Country culture and organizational culture drive how reward, capitalization, transparency, decision-making and fairness factor into a complex system.
My starting point usually is a quantitative and qualitative assessment of how the firm’s Reward Trilogy™ fits together.
Contact me now to build your legacy by evolving your partner compensation structure to cultivate a cohesive, winning partnership.