In this session, Nick Salmon will talk us through how one professional services firm addresses the challenge of helping its partners take on leadership roles and rapidly become fully effective.

White & Case is an international law firm in 30+ countries, with 750+ partners and 6,000+ staff. On the legal side, the partners that lead the business typically take on their roles for a 3-4 year rotation whilst continuing as practising partners. These roles include overseeing countries/offices, leading practice areas, leading client relationships and leading industry sectors. The issue the Firm wrestled with historically was how to accelerate the learning curve for partners taking on these roles, such that they would be as effective as possible as quickly as possible.

One Task Force and 6 years of leadership training later, the Firm has an institutionalized program to support around 30 new leaders each year that is highly valued by successive cohorts of new leaders. How did the Firm approach the challenge?

Nick Salmon, EMEA COO in the Firm, is part of a small team that took this from conception to creation and on to business as usual. He remains part of the group that oversees the program and is a regular trainer on it.

He will talk us through how the Firm got from an idea to a respected and embedded program, what it looks like and some of the challenges that had to be overcome along the way.

SPEAKER

Nick Salmon is the EMEA Chief Operating Officer of White & Case and oversees the operations of the Firm’s offices in Europe, the Middle East, and Africa. 

He is responsible for ensuring that the EMEA offices and practices are working on an integrated basis with the Firm’s global network.  

Nick provides leadership to business services support staff across Europe, the Middle East, and Africa and coordinates their activities to ensure the strategy and operational plans are successfully implemented. 

He works closely with partner leaders in the Firm overseeing EMEA practices and EMEA offices. He is also responsible for ensuring that all appropriate infrastructure and processes to support the effective running of the EMEA region are in place. 

Nick is a senior professional services firm director and general manager with 25 years’ experience in law firm management roles. He joined White & Case to establish its Asia COO role, which he held from 2009 to 2013; since then, he has been the EMEA COO. 

Prior to joining White & Case he worked with Linklaters for 11 years in practice management roles and as the Asia COO. He also held positions in Lloyd’s of London prior to moving into the legal industry. 

This meeting is open to Innovation Partnership members and partners. If you are a board member / C-suite / senior leader and wish to apply to join please email hello@innovationpartnership.co.uk