Assistant Director: Lateral Partner Integration

Mayer Brown LLP•Chicago, IL

3d•$182,000 - $250,000•Hybrid

About The Position

Mayer Brown is an international law firm positioned to represent the world’s major corporations, funds, and financial institutions in their most important and complex transactions and disputes. We are recognized by our clients as strategic partners with deep commercial instincts and a commitment to creatively anticipating their needs and delivering excellence in everything we do.We are a collegial, collaborative firm where highly motivated individuals with an unwavering commitment to excellence receive the opportunity, support, and development they need to grow, thrive, and realize their greatest potential all while supporting the Firm’s client service principles of excellence, strategic partnership, commercial instinct, integrated strengths, innovation, and collaboration across our international firm.If you enjoy working with team members whose defining characteristics are exceptional client service, initiative, professionalism, responsiveness, and adaptability, you may be the person we are seeking to join our Business Development and Marketing department in our Chicago or New York office, as an Assistant Director: Lateral Partner Integration. The Assistant Director of Lateral Partner Integration is responsible, on a global basis, for ensuring the successful onboarding, transition, and performance ramp-up of lateral partners joining the firm. This individual will act as the strategic point of contact for new partners, coordinating all aspects of integration — cultural, operational, client-facing, and business development — with a focus on accelerating revenue generation and deepening connectivity across the firm. This role reports to the Senior Director of Commercial Strategy & Growth and serves as the single point of accountability for the integration lifecycle through month 12. This role is critical to ensuring the firm’s investment in lateral hiring results in productivity, client retention, and long-term partnership success.

Requirements

Bachelor’s degree required, preferably in human resources, recruiting, marketing, or communications. A combination of education and/or experience may be considered in lieu of the degree when the experience has been directly related to the functions of the role.
Ten years or more of experience in a law firm or professional services environment. Prior experience in partner-level onboarding, talent management, recruiting, or professional development preferred.
Experience managing complex, multi-stakeholder processes across offices or regions
Direct experience working with senior lawyers, practice leaders, or executive leadership
Experience coordinating functions across HR, IT, conflicts, finance, and business development
Experience developing or executing structured onboarding or integration programs (strongly preferred)
Strong understanding of law firm economics, partnership structures, and lateral hiring dynamics
Familiarity with legal industry market trends and competitive talent landscape
Knowledge of cross-selling, client development, and practice integration concepts
Understanding of confidentiality, conflicts, legal ethics, and partner mobility risk factors
Proficiency in Microsoft Office products
Experience with CRM systems (e.g. InterAction) and/or talent systems
Ability to track and report integration metrics and pull data-driven insights
Comfortable learning and using legal tech, onboarding tools, and business intelligence platforms
Strong writing skills for drafting onboarding plans, executive updates, and communications
Excellent written and verbal communication skills, able to communicate effectively and in a professional manner with all levels of the Firm and outside contacts
Highly responsive, service-oriented, and proactive in communication
Exceptional relationship-builder — able to engage senior lateral partners immediately
Ability to work in a diverse team environment and effectively support the demanding needs of the Firm
Ability to work under pressure and meet deadlines with shifting priorities
Must be a self-starter with a high level of initiative
Strong customer service skills, able to anticipate needs and exercise independent judgment
Strong attention to detail, organizational skills and the ability to manage multiple projects
Maintains confidentiality and exercises discretion
Exercises solid strategic thinking and problem-solving skills
Demonstrated good judgment, a team-first orientation, meticulous and results driven.
Designs and executes integration plans that adapt to different practices, personalities, and markets
Identifies onboarding gaps, unmet needs, and emerging risks before they become problems
Anticipates challenges related to tech access, client transitions, or internal resource alignment
Analyzes client lists to find synergies, overlaps, and cross-selling opportunities
Tracks data and integration metrics to assess success and refine strategies
Prioritizes tasks based on impact — e.g., IT first, to ensure client continuity
Balances conflicting priorities (onboarding vs. client deadlines)
Develops scalable processes (e.g., standardized checklists + custom plans)
Uses dashboards (e.g., Power BI) to analyze pipeline, matter opens, and collections vs. plan

Responsibilities

Build and manage the pre-start integration process to reduce uncertainty and ensure readiness
Coordinate early introductions with key administrative contacts (IT, HR, Legal Resources, billing, records, talent, etc.)
Develop and circulate pre-arrival integration checklists and follow-up communications
Coordinate LPQ intake, conflicts clearance, and ethical walls, ensuring matter opening and client communications align with applicable rules
Working with the Lateral Partner Hiring team and key business services professionals throughout our network, ensure a structured onboarding schedule that includes key orientations and relationship-building
Prevent "bystander effect” by clearly assigning responsibilities and monitoring follow-through
Balance onboarding tasks with client demands by prioritizing IT access, communications, and seamless client transition
Own Day 0/Day 2 access SLAs (SSO, DMS, time/billing, CRM, collaboration tools) and confirm device provisioning and security compliance
Publish a 30/60/90/180/365 integration plan with KPIs tied to the hiring business case, reviewed monthly with sponsors
Develop protocols for defining primary point of contact depending on whether the hire is a standard practice hire or a member of the Accelerated Growth or Priority Product areas
Serve as the lateral partner’s main internal contact (“their person”) for all questions, issues, and guidance (may differ if Practice managers act as primary contact with AG hires)
Act as liaison to business services stakeholders, enabling partners to stay client-focused
Maintain high-touch, responsive communication through the full integration period. This includes not only the Lateral Partner but the Lateral Partner Sponsoring Partner(s) as well
Conduct regular integration check-ins (first week, first month, quarterly, etc.)
Proactively identify gaps in onboarding, unmet needs, or emerging risks
Provide tools such as business plan templates and key upcoming deadlines
Collaborate with business development, Lateral Partner Sponsor Partner(s), and practice leadership to identify client overlaps and integration opportunities
Facilitate introductions to client relationship partners and cross-practice colleagues
Track and encourage expansion of the lateral’s client work within the firm
Create individualized 6–12 month integration plans for each lateral partner dependent upon the rationale for hire
Include visibility milestones, internal and external activities, and client introductions
Standardize “baseline” integration tasks applicable to all lateral partners
Drive internal visibility through meetings, partner lunches, retreats, roadshows, etc.
Coordinate external visibility: publications, conferences, thought leadership, sponsorships, and importantly, client visits
Ensure partner’s market profile is tied effectively to the firm’s brand
Work with integration sponsors and practice leaders to ensure follow-through
Support assignment of integration teams and ownership structures
Track both qualitative feedback and quantitative metrics and report to leadership
Maintain regular ROI assessment of Lateral hires, assessing revenue generation, client retention, performance against business plan, collaboration and integration
Manages the full lateral integration lifecycle from pre-arrival to post-integration
Coordinates and oversees internal stakeholders across departments
Assigns responsibilities clearly and monitors follow-through (“anti-bystander” leadership)
Leads integration team efforts and partner sponsors
Manages relationship-building activity between the lateral and firm partners
Oversees onboarding structure, visibility programming, and cross-practice synergies
Owns reporting to leadership on progress, risks, and results
Influences without authority — key skill for working with senior partners
Demonstrates leadership and supervisory experience including managing projects and workflows, effectively leveraging business services team support as needed
Leads by example, providing guidance, coaching, and mentorship
Tracks ROI against the hiring business case
Prepares monthly financial snapshots and recommends course corrections
Operational budget analysis and recommendations
Conducts analysis of staffing levels and participation in the recruitment process
Able to determine and implement change processes to improve workflow efficiencies
Process- and service-oriented with strong leadership and project management skills
Able to set priorities and delegate in an efficient manner
Analysis of staffing levels and requests for assistance
Operational budget analysis and recommendations

Benefits

We offer competitive compensation and comprehensive benefits, including medical/dental/vision/life/and AD&D insurance, 401(k) savings plan, back-up childcare and eldercare, generous paid time off (PTO), as well as opportunities for professional development and growth.

Stand Out From the Crowd

Upload your resume and get instant feedback on how well it matches this job.

Upload and Match Resume