Allen & Overy launches flex-working for partners
22 January 2010
Allen & Overy is breaking with tradition by launching a new flexible working scheme for its partners.

The firm's other fee earners, from NQ up to salaried partners, are already able to work part-time and, from Saturday 1st May equity partners will be able to do so too. The new scheme offers them the choice of working a four day week or taking a maximum of 52 days extra holiday a year.

The scheme is available to all partners in all offices, although the firm believes its chief attraction will be to women. Senior Partner David Morley said that this "provides greater career flexibility and removes some of the existing obstacles to promotion faced in particular by women".

Partners that take part in the scheme will be paid on a pro rata basis, but their profit share will be capped at 30 points (which is what a partner of five years' vintage pulls in). With each point worth around £30k, that's a lot of wedge for a part-time job.

A flexible partner yesterday

How it will work in reality remains to be seen. Combining part-time hours with client demands is never easy, particularly at a firm where 24/7 availability is expected... 

However it seems to be a serious attempt to address an imbalance which bedevills all big firms: 62% of A&O's UK graduate intake is female - but that figures drops to just 19% of its UK partners. What's more, it sets the new standard for the rest of the Magic Circle to match: when combined with the basic holiday entitlement, it allows parents to take every school holiday off - that's got to be good news.