合伙人含金量缩水

    希望能进律师事务所工作的年轻人也不例外。面试中最关键的问题不再是“我什么时候能成为合伙人？”，而是“成为合伙人究竟意味着什么？”

    扬说，有时候，成为合伙人可能包括不利合约。一些事务所强迫律师签署协议，如果退出合伙人将受到惩罚。比如，扬知道的某些事务所要求合伙人离开时必须缴回上一年所有的资本收益。

    虽然如此，“合伙人”一词还是颇有分量。只要成为合伙人仍意味着薪酬上调，它的重要性就不会消失。即便合伙合约已经变了，这一身份的重要意义并未改变。扬打了个比方，说它就像Polo衫上的标识。这是传统体系的传承，是可以告诉父母的喜讯，也可以在鸡尾酒派对上让人刮目相看。

    “我们这个社会注重形形色色的名号，”康奈尔大学（Cornell）产业劳工关系学院（Industrial and Labor Relations School）的人力资本发展执行主任迈克尔•赛瑞诺称。对于在学校和职场一路斩获各种成就和荣誉的人们，争取获得一家顶级律师事务所的合伙人名号尤其重要。

    但环境也很重要：成为合伙人不只是影响内心感受，瑞斯金说：“它不仅仅关乎自尊，事实上它也是一种定位——影响到人们对一个人的专业认知。”总的来说，客户倾向于与合伙人共事，他们可不管背后实际的薪酬协议是怎样规定的。

    话虽如此，从业人员也在改变。相比在事务所工作年限更长的雇员，如今的年轻人在工作中追求的东西已经变了。一般而言，事务所的新人对长期忠于一家公司并不那么感兴趣，他们更希望能建立一个能够支撑自身价值体系的职业。这往往意味着更频繁的跳槽，与律师事务所的传统合伙人体制格格不入；传统合伙人体制往往要求员工在一家公司工作多年，其中有些收入要到成为合伙人后才能兑现。

    另一方面，当今很多年轻人进入律师事务所或金融公司时并没有赶上好时候，公司并没有超量的股本和资金分给大家，这也使传统的合伙人模式无以为继。

    赛瑞诺说：“我不认为还有什么是必然的，或许传统模式过去的确具有更多的确定性。”成功当上合伙人的员工必须重新斟酌老一套的观念，随时准备迎接就业市场的转变。换言之，大型律师事务所的新丁们需要重新界定这个传统意义上的里程碑。

    译者：老榆木

    That includes young people looking for jobs at firms. No longer is the key question during an interview, "when will I make partner?" but instead, "what, exactly, does making partner mean?"

    In some cases, becoming partner can include a rather toxic contract, Young says. Some firms force lawyers to sign agreements that penalize them for leaving the partnership. Young knows of firms, for example, that require partners to agree to forfeit all of their capital contributions from the previous year should they decide to leave.

    Yet still, the term "partner" holds sway. And as long as a partnership also means a pay increase, its associated cachet will stick around. Even though the contracts have changed, the status hasn't. It's like the logo on a polo shirt, Young says. It's a holdover from the traditional system, and it's something to tell your parents, or use to impress people at a cocktail party.

    "We are a society that recognizes pedigree steps along the way," says Michael Serino, executive director of Human Capital Development at Cornell's Industrial and Labor Relations School. That's especially true for the kind of person competing to make partner at a top law firm, who has probably been raised on accolades they've received for various educational and professional achievements.

    But context is also important: being a partner doesn't only matter internally, Riskin says: "It's not just ego, it's really positioning -- it affects the way this individual will be perceived professionally." Clients, on the whole, prefer to work with partners, regardless of the compensation agreements behind the curtain.

    That being said, the workforce is changing. Younger people want different things from their jobs than employees who have been at firms longer. Generally, new hires at firms are less interested in loyalty to one company long-term, and more interested in building a career that supports their value system. That tends to mean more job-hopping, which is less conducive to a system that requires paying dues at one firm for years until making partner.

    On the flip side, many young people entering legal or financial firms are taking those jobs at a time when there simply isn't an excess of equity and funding to divvy up between people, which somewhat starves the old partnership model.

    "I don't think there are any givens anymore, and perhaps the old model had more givens," Serino says. "The people that navigate that successfully have to reconsider the assumptions and constantly be ready to anticipate how workplace market conditions are going to change." In other words, young people at big firms will need to redefine the old milestones.